n. A large ornamental letter formerly used at the start of a chapter or section of a book.
the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English
n. A large ornamental letter used, esp. by the early printers, at the commencement of the chapters and other divisions of a book.
The Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
n. A combination of flowers or ornamental types of decoration, in imitation of the engraved head-bands of the early printers: a typographic fashion in England in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.
Word Usage
"The passage is this; speaking of "eminent persons buried" at Waltham Abbey, he says: "we spoil all, if we forget Robert Passellew, who was _dominus fac totum_ in the middle -- and _fac nihil_ towards the end -- of the reign of Henry III.""