tambour

noun

1. (countable, uncountable)A small shallow drum.
2. (countable, uncountable)A circular frame for embroidery.

   “Recollect Lady Teazle when I saw you first—sitting at your tambour in a pretty figured linen gown—”

3. (countable, uncountable)A rich kind of gold and silver embroidery.
4. (countable, uncountable)Silk or other material embroidered on a tambour.
5. (countable, uncountable)The capital of a Corinthian column.
6. (countable, uncountable)Synonym of drum (“cylindrical stone in the shaft of a column”).
7. (countable, uncountable)A work usually in the form of a redan, to enclose a space before a door or staircase, or at the gorge of a larger work. It is arranged like a stockade.
8. (countable, uncountable)A shallow metallic cup or drum, with a thin elastic membrane supporting a writing lever. Two or more of these are connected by a rubber tube and used to transmit and register the movements of the pulse or of any pulsating artery.
9. (countable, uncountable)In real tennis, a buttress-like obstruction in the main wall.

   “One hazard is the tambour, a buttress which juts out and causes the ball to bounce unpredictably.”

10. (countable, uncountable)A rolling top or front (as of a rolltop desk) of narrow strips of wood glued on canvas.

verb

1. (ambitransitive)To embroider on a tambour (circular frame).