The Beekeeper of Aleppo: List 3

by Christy Lefteri
When war destroys their life in Syria, Nuri Ibrahim tries to hold onto hope that he and his grieving wife will survive the dangerous journey to a new home.

This list covers Chapter 7–"The Song."

Here are links to our lists for the novel: List 1, List 2, List 3, List 4
35 words 8 learners

Learn words with Flashcards and other activities

Definition First
Print Flashcards

Other learning activities

Answer a few questions about each word. Use this to prep for your next quiz! Compete with other teams in real time to see who answers the most questions correctly! Test your spelling acumen. Read the definition, listen to the word and try spelling it!

Teaching tools

Create and assign quizzes to your students to test their vocabulary. Assign learning activities including Practice, Vocabulary Jams and Spelling Bees to your students, and monitor their progress in real-time.

Full list of words from this list:

words only definitions & notes
  1. unfathomable
    impossible to come to understand
    Yes, there are deep lines that were not there before, and even my eyes seem to have changed—they are darker and wider, always on the alert, like Mohammed’s eyes, but it’s not that; something else has changed, something unfathomable.
  2. venture
    proceed somewhere despite the risk of possible dangers
    Apart from our meetings with Lucy Fisher, this is the first time that she has agreed to venture out of our bedroom, to allow herself in some small way to be part of the world.
  3. coincide
    be the same
    It was my job to ensure that the honeybee populations coincided with the nectar flows.
  4. objective
    the goal intended to be attained
    I had to know where they occurred, where the crops were located, and then make plans so that I could manage the colonies and achieve my objectives, because it wasn’t just honey we were producing, but pollen and propolis and royal jelly.
  5. foliage
    the collective amount of leaves of one or more plants
    I have to pull hard to take it off, it’s tangled in the foliage, and then I put the bicycle next to the fence so that I can step on it to climb back over.
  6. verifiable
    capable of being proven
    We were being transformed into verifiable, printable entities.
  7. immaculate
    completely neat and clean
    We found ourselves enclosed in barbed wire, and before us was a grim village with immaculate concrete walkways, wire-mesh fences, and white gravel.
  8. makeshift
    done or made using whatever is available
    There were rows and rows of square makeshift cabins constructed of corrugated metal, for people to stay in until they got their papers.
  9. corrugated
    shaped into alternating parallel grooves and ridges
    There were rows and rows of square makeshift cabins constructed of corrugated metal, for people to stay in until they got their papers.
  10. partition
    separate or apportion into sections
    Each cabin was already divided, partitioned with blankets and sheets to make room for more families.
  11. chasm
    a deep opening in the earth's surface
    Her unspoken words had opened a chasm, and from that place images came and went like dreams—Mohammed’s black eyes, Sami’s eyes the color of Afra’s.
  12. leper
    one afflicted with a disease involving wasting of body parts
    “This island was a leper colony once,” she said.
  13. solace
    comfort offered to one who is disappointed or miserable
    Mustafa grew up under the care and protection of his father and grandfather, no women to soften the place or bring light to it, no siblings to play with, so he found solace in the brilliant light and beautiful sounds and smells of the apiaries.
  14. faltering
    unsteady in speech or action
    Sitting in that cool living room, we seemed to be surrounded by Mustafa’s mother’s never- faltering smile, a smile that engulfed us and wove itself around us, a bit like the sweet sound of the bees.
  15. eccentric
    conspicuously or grossly unconventional or unusual
    He had been a lonely child, and grew up to be a self-sufficient and eccentric young man.
  16. banter
    light teasing repartee
    Further away there was banter, people talking and laughing.
  17. mesmerizing
    attracting and holding interest as if by a spell
    I looked at the picture again. The colors were wild—the tree blue, the sky red. The lines were broken, leaves and flowers out of place, and yet it held a beauty that was mesmerizing and indescribable, like an image in a dream, like a picture of a world that is beyond our imagination.
  18. wisp
    a thin tuft, piece, or amount of something
    There are no planes circling, only a passenger plane far away, appearing through a wisp of clouds, and above us only seagulls.
  19. urn
    a large pot for making coffee or tea
    Shoes are displayed in shop windows, fake designer handbags, rugs and boxes and coffee urns and perfume and leather, and at the end of the row a stall full of head scarves of the finest material, like smoke streaming in the lamplight, blue and ocher and green.
  20. bustle
    move or cause to move energetically or busily
    Mustafa’s father lived a solitary life in the mountains, while my mother and father were city people, working in the heat and chaos of the markets, where trade bustled from all over the world.
  21. tic
    a usually unconscious habit or quirk of speech or behavior
    He nodded, then shook his head very quickly, a tic I was to become so familiar with.
  22. subside
    wear off or die down
    The heartbeat in my head subsided, but the screaming continued, and when it stopped abruptly, a few moments later, there were other sounds, echoes from other rooms on other floors, desperate adult sobs, creaking floorboards, footsteps and whispers and laughter.
  23. reverberate
    ring or echo with sound
    When the door was closed again, its metallic sound, which reverberated around the courtyard, had died, and I was left facing a huge blue heart painted across the double doors, outlined on both sides with red wings.
  24. sprawl
    sit or lie with one's limbs spread out
    Then, beneath the ferns and palm trees, we saw a small village of tents and people sprawled on blankets.
  25. emaciated
    very thin, especially from disease or hunger or cold
    Opposite was a statue of an ancient warrior, and on the step of this statue sat an emaciated man.
  26. lute
    a stringed instrument with a pear-shaped body
    He had his guitar on his lap: a beautiful instrument, almost a lute, but not exactly.
  27. listless
    lacking zest or vivacity
    And then Mahsa gave up and went back to being listless.
  28. ministry
    a government department
    After not too much time, and with a deliberately lower voice, he said, “I was in Ministry of Defense. Then Taliban threaten me. I told them I cannot kill people. I cannot even kill ant—how do you expect me to kill people?”
  29. captivated
    filled with wonder and delight
    I found myself lost in the story, captivated by Nadim’s singsong voice, engrossed in the images of the boy in a house in Kabul playing the tabla, and I forgot for a moment the question I had asked, which remained unanswered.
  30. engrossed
    giving or marked by complete attention to
    I found myself lost in the story, captivated by Nadim’s singsong voice, engrossed in the images of the boy in a house in Kabul playing the tabla, and I forgot for a moment the question I had asked, which remained unanswered.
  31. interval
    a definite length of time marked off by two instants
    The crickets sang in unison, then fell silent for a brief moment, an interval, as if they were one breathing body that suddenly stopped, before the sound began again, a thick pounding buzzing noise that stretched far beyond and carved out the depths of the woods and the unknown.
  32. malice
    the desire to see others suffer
    Nadim grinned now with a kind of glee, and there was the sudden flash of a different personality, a kind of mocking or malice that comes from someone who knows more than he is letting on.
  33. antiquity
    the historic period preceding the Middle Ages in Europe
    But this word seemed final, and I didn’t even know what “a long time” meant anymore. Was it weeks or months or years or centuries like these heroes of antiquity cast here in stone?
  34. prominent
    having a quality that thrusts itself into attention
    He was already a small man, hardly any fat on him, with bulging knuckles and a prominent Adam’s apple that moved visibly when he talked, but his presence was big; his silence and contemplation often filled the room.
  35. astray
    away from the right path or direction
    “Mustafa. That boy is wild. I knew he would lead you astray.”
Created on Thu Apr 27 11:47:53 EDT 2023 (updated Thu Apr 27 19:33:36 EDT 2023)

Sign up now (it’s free!)

Whether you’re a teacher or a learner, Vocabulary.com can put you or your class on the path to systematic vocabulary improvement.