Word of the day: coping

The word of the day is coping:

1. a finishing or protective course or cap to an exterior masonry wall or the like.
2. a piece of woodwork having its end shaped to fit together with a molding.

c.1600 as an architectural term, from cope (n.), the cape-like vestment worn by priests (14c.), a variant of cape. (http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/coping) 

"Then Ysabel sat down on the coping of the tank and smoked a cigarette with the shadows of bamboo leaves flickering over him, but by the time she thought of her sketch pad he had risen and was leading the horses and mules back through the court and under her, out of sight."

 - Wallace Stegner, Angle of Repose