different between branch vs circle

English

Alternative forms

• braunch (obsolete)

Etymology

From Middle English branche, braunche, bronche, borrowed from Old French branche, brance, from Late Latin branca (“footprint”, later also “paw, claw”), of unknown origin, possibly from Gaulish *vranca, from Proto-Indo-European *wrónk-eh?.

Indo-European cognates include Old Norse vró (“angle, corner”), Lithuanian rankà (“hand”), Old Church Slavonic ???? (r?ka, “hand”), Albanian rangë (“yardwork”).

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) enPR: bränch, IPA^(key): /b???nt?/
• (US, Northern England) enPR: br?nch, IPA^(key): /b?ænt?/
• Rhymes: -??nt?, -ænt?

Noun

branch (plural branches)

2. The woody part of a tree arising from the trunk and usually dividing.
3. Any of the parts of something that divides like the branch of a tree.

4. (chiefly Southern US) A creek or stream which flows into a larger river. (compare Ohio, Pennsylvania and West Virginia run, and New York and New England brook.)
5. (geometry) One of the portions of a curve that extends outwards to an indefinitely great distance.

6. A location of an organization with several locations.

8. A line of family descent, in distinction from some other line or lines from the same stock; any descendant in such a line.
   • 1602, Richard Carew, Survey of Cornwall

     his father, a younger branch of the ancient stock

9. (Mormonism) A local congregation of the LDS Church that is not large enough to form a ward; see Wikipedia article on ward in LDS church.
11. An area in business or of knowledge, research.
12. (nautical) A certificate given by Trinity House to a pilot qualified to take navigational control of a ship in British waters.
13. (computing) A sequence of code that is conditionally executed.
14. (computing) A group of related files in a source control system, including for example source code, build scripts, and media such as images.
15. (rail transport) A branch line.

Synonyms

• (part of a tree): bough, limb, tillow, twig; see also Thesaurus:tree

Derived terms

Translations

Verb

branch (third-person singular simple present branches, present participle branching, simple past and past participle branched)

1. (intransitive) To arise from the trunk or a larger branch of a tree.
2. (intransitive) To produce branches.
   • 1944, Emily Carr, The House of All Sorts, "Life Loves Living," [2]:

     The tree throve and branched so heavily that the windows of Lower West and the Doll's Flat were darkened.

3. (transitive, intransitive) To (cause to) divide into separate parts or subdivisions.
4. (intransitive, computing) To jump to a different location in a program, especially as the result of a conditional statement.
5. (transitive, colloquial) To discipline (a union member) at a branch meeting.
   • 2003, Paul Routledge, The Bumper Book of British Lefties (page 199)

     His staff were 'not journalists, but Communists', he maintained. Nonetheless, in 1948 his vigorous editorship took the paper's circulation to 120,000 a day. The following year, he was 'branched' by the National Union of Journalists for an intemperate attack on Fleet Street.

Related terms

• branch off
• branch out

Translations

References

Further reading

• branch on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• branch (disambiguation) on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

Haitian Creole

Etymology

From French branche (“branch”).

Noun

branch

1. branch

Middle English

Etymology 1

Noun

branch

1. Alternative form of braunche

Etymology 2

Verb

branch

1. Alternative form of braunchen

English

Etymology

From Middle English circle, cercle, from Old French cercle and Latin circulus, diminutive of Latin circus (“circle, circus”), from Ancient Greek ?????? (kírkos, “circle, ring”), related to Old English hring (“ring”). Compare also Old English ?ircul (“circle, zodiac”), which came from the same Latin source.

Pronunciation

• enPR: sûr?-k?l, IPA^(key): /?s??k?l/
  • (UK) IPA^(key): [?s??.k??]
  • (US) IPA^(key): [?s?.k??]
• Rhymes: -??(?)k?l
• Homophone: cercal
• Hyphenation: cir?cle

Noun

circle (plural circles)

1. (geometry) A two-dimensional geometric figure, a line, consisting of the set of all those points in a plane that are equally distant from a given point (center).

   Synonyms: (not in mathematical use) coil, (not in mathematical use) ring, (not in mathematical use) loop

2. A two-dimensional geometric figure, a disk, consisting of the set of all those points of a plane at a distance less than or equal to a fixed distance (radius) from a given point.

   Synonyms: disc, (in mathematical and general use) disk, (not in mathematical use; UK & Commonwealth only) round

3. Any shape, curve or arrangement of objects that approximates to or resembles the geometric figures.

   Children, please join hands and form a circle.

   1. Any thin three-dimensional equivalent of the geometric figures.

   2. A curve that more or less forms part or all of a circle.

4. A specific group of persons; especially one who shares a common interest.

   Synonyms: bunch, gang, group

   • At half-past nine on this Saturday evening, the parlour of the Salutation Inn, High Holborn, contained most of its customary visitors. […] In former days every tavern of repute kept such a room for its own select circle, a club, or society, of habitués, who met every evening, for a pipe and a cheerful glass.

   • “I don't mean all of your friends—only a small proportion—which, however, connects your circle with that deadly, idle, brainless bunch—the insolent chatterers at the opera, the gorged dowagers, […], the jewelled animals whose moral code is the code of the barnyard—!"

   • 1922, Margery Williams, The Velveteen Rabbit

     The Rabbit could not claim to be a model of anything, for he didn’t know that real rabbits existed; he thought they were all stuffed with sawdust like himself, and he understood that sawdust was quite out-of-date and should never be mentioned in modern circles.

5. The orbit of an astronomical body.
6. (cricket) A line comprising two semicircles of 30 yards radius centred on the wickets joined by straight lines parallel to the pitch used to enforce field restrictions in a one-day match.
7. (Wicca) A ritual circle that is cast three times deosil and closes three times widdershins either in the air with a wand or literally with stones or other items used for worship.
8. (South Africa) A traffic circle or roundabout.
9. (obsolete) Compass; circuit; enclosure.
10. (astronomy) An instrument of observation, whose graduated limb consists of an entire circle. When fixed to a wall in an observatory, it is called a mural circle; when mounted with a telescope on an axis and in Y's, in the plane of the meridian, a meridian or transit circle; when involving the principle of reflection, like the sextant, a reflecting circle; and when that of repeating an angle several times continuously along the graduated limb, a repeating circle.
11. A series ending where it begins, and repeating itself.

    • Thus in a circle runs the peasant's pain.

12. (logic) A form of argument in which two or more unproved statements are used to prove each other; inconclusive reasoning.
    • 1661, Joseph Glanvill, The Vanity of Dogmatizing

      That heavy bodies descend by gravity; and, again, that gravity is a quality whereby a heavy body descends, is an impertinent circle and teaches nothing.

13. Indirect form of words; circumlocution.
    • 1610, Ben Jonson, The Alchemist

      Has he given the lie, / In circle, or oblique, or semicircle.

14. A territorial division or district.

15. (in the plural) A bagginess of the skin below the eyes from lack of sleep.

Derived terms

Related terms

• circular
• circulate
• circus

Descendants

• Pitcairn-Norfolk: sirkil

Translations

Verb

circle (third-person singular simple present circles, present participle circling, simple past and past participle circled)

1. (transitive) To travel around along a curved path.

   The wolves circled the herd of deer.
2. (transitive) To surround.

   A high fence circles the enclosure.

   • 1699, William Dampier, Voyages and Descriptions

     Their heads are circled with a short turban.

   • 1798, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, The Dungeon

     So he lies, circled with evil.

3. (transitive) To place or mark a circle around.

   Circle the jobs that you are interested in applying for.

4. (intransitive) To travel in circles.

   Vultures circled overhead.

Derived terms

• circle the drain

Translations

Anagrams

• cleric