parket, a ‘parakeet’. Marston, The Fawn, ii. 1 (Nymphadore).
parlance, speaking, speech; parleying. Speed, Hist. Gt. Britain, ix. 12. 575 (NED.). Norm. F. parlance, ‘entretien’ (Moisy).
parlant, one who parleys, or takes part in a conference. Warner, Alb. England, bk. iii, ch. 19, st. 32.
parle, a parley, conference. Tam. Shrew i. 1. 117; Hamlet, i. 1. 62; to parley. L. L. L. v. 2. 122.
parlous, alarming, mischievous, ‘perilous’, shrewd. Mids. Night’s D. iii. 1. 14; Richard III, ii. 4. 35.
parmesant, cheese made in the duchy of Parma. Middleton, The Changeling, i. 2 (3 Madman); parmesent, Ford, ’Tis pity, i. 4 (Poggio). F. parmesan, Ital. parmegiano, belonging to Parma. See Stanford (s.v. Parmesan).
parnel, a wanton young woman. Phillips, Dict., 1678; Becon, Popish Mass (Works, iii. 41), see NED. ME. pernelle (P. Plowman, B. iv. 116); F. peronnelle, ‘une femme de peu’ (Dict. Acad., ed. 1762). ‘Parnel’ orig. a feminine Christian name, ME. Peronelle (Gower, C. A. i. 3396); OF. Peronelle, a Christian name from St. Petronilla. Hence the surname Parnell (Bardsley, 582).
paroli, at faro or basset, the leaving of the money staked and the money won as a new stake; a doubling of the stakes. Farquhar, Sir Harry Wildair, ii. 1 (Banter); id., ii. 2 (Wildair). Ital. paroli, ‘a grand part, set, or cast at dice’; parolare, ‘to play at a grand part at dice’ (Florio). See Stanford.
paronomasia, a pun, play upon words; ‘The jingle of a more poor paranomasia’, Dryden, Account of Annus Mirabilis. Gk. παρονομσία. See Stanford.
parreal, ‘pair-royal’; meaning three of a sort. ‘The we’s, which is a distinct parreal of wit bound by itself’, &c., Parson’s Wedding, ii. 3 (Wanton). The allusion is probably to the public-house sign, ‘We Three Loggerheads be’, a jocular painting of two silly-looking faces, the unsuspecting spectator being of course the third. See History of Signboards (1866), p. 458. See [pair-royal].