noun Ecclesiastical.
- a linen vestment with narrow sleeves, worn chiefly by priests, now invariably white in the Western Church but can be in a color in the Eastern Church.
- (in prescriptions) white.
noun
- Christianity a long white linen vestment with sleeves worn by priests and others
abbreviation for
- Albania(n)
late Old English albe, from Late Latin alba (in tunica alba or vestis alba “white vestment”), fem. of albus “white,” from PIE root *albho- “white” (cf. Greek alphos “white leprosy,” alphiton “barley meal;” Old High German albiz, Old English elfet “swan,” literally “the white bird;” Old Church Slavonic and Russian lebedi, Polish łabędź “swan;” Hittite alpash “cloud”).