Etymology

From free +‎ stoneCategory:English compound terms#FREESTONE.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈfɹiːstəʊn/Category:English 2-syllable words#FREESTONECategory:English terms with IPA pronunciation#FREESTONE
• (US) IPA^(key): /ˈfɹiːstoʊn/Category:English 2-syllable words#FREESTONECategory:English terms with IPA pronunciation#FREESTONE

• Audio (US):

  (file)

  Category:English terms with audio pronunciation#FREESTONE
• Rhymes: -iːstəʊnCategory:Rhymes:English/iːstəʊn#FREESTONECategory:Rhymes:English/iːstəʊn/2 syllables#FREESTONE

Noun

freestone (countable and uncountable, plural freestones)Category:English lemmas#FREESTONECategory:English nouns#FREESTONECategory:English uncountable nouns#FREESTONECategory:English countable nouns#FREESTONECategory:English countable nouns#FREESTONECategory:English entries with incorrect language header#FREESTONECategory:Pages with entries#FREESTONECategory:Pages with 1 entry#FREESTONE

1. Sedimentary rock: a type of stone that is composed of small particles and easily shaped, most commonly sandstone or limestone.
   • 1749, Henry Fielding, The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling:

     Mr Allworthy […] died immensely rich and built an hospital […] but had he done nothing more I should have left him to have recorded his own merit on some fair freestone over the door of that hospital.

     Category:English terms with quotations#FREESTONE

   • 1853, John Ruskin, “IV, St. Mark's”, in The Stones of Venice, volume II (The Sea-Stories), London: Smith, Elder, and Co., […], →OCLC, § XXVII, page 77:

     It might, under all the circumstances above stated, have been a question with other builders, whether to import one shipload of costly jaspers, or twenty of chalk flints; and whether to build a small church faced with porphyry and paved with agate, or to raise a vast cathedral in freestone.

     Category:English terms with quotations#FREESTONE

   • 1955 June, C. L. Mowat, “The Bristol & Portishead Pier & Railway”, in Railway Magazine, page 378:

     The exterior walls are of freestone, and have a smooth, neat appearance.

     Category:English terms with quotations#FREESTONE

2. (countableCategory:English countable nouns#FREESTONE) A stone fruit having a stone (pit) that is relatively free of the flesh.