different between chevron vs echelon

English

Alternative forms

• cheveron (dated)

Etymology

Borrowed from French chevron (“rafter, chevron”), the mark so called because it looks like rafters of a shallow roof, from Vulgar Latin *capri?, from Latin caper (“goat”), the likely connection between goats and rafters being the animal's angular hind legs.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /???v??n/

Noun

chevron (plural chevrons)

1. A V-shaped pattern; used in architecture, and as an insignia of military or police rank, on the sleeve
2. (heraldry) A wide inverted V placed on a shield.
3. (chiefly Britain) One of the V-shaped markings on the surface of roads used to indicate minimum distances between vehicles.
   • 2009, Jamie Dunn, Truckie has a point, Sunshine Coast Daily Online, June 13, 2009.

     I told you that in fact they were called chevrons and it was an exercise by the transport department to teach us to stay two chevrons behind the car in front.

4. A guillemet, either of the punctuation marks “«” or “»”, used in several languages to indicate passages of speech. Similar to typical quotation marks used in the English language such as ““” and “””.
5. An angle bracket, either used as a typographic or a scientific symbol.
6. (informal) A há?ek, a diacritical mark that may resemble an inverted circumflex.
   • 1953, William James Entwistle, Aspects of Language (Faber and Faber), page 107

     It is pertinent to remember, however, that one of the greatest phoneticians, Jan Hus, used diacritics (in the form of points, which have later become chevrons in his own language), and that his alphabet is the most satisfactory for eastern Europe, since it has been officially adopted by the languages which use the Latin script.

   • 1976, Stephen J. Lieberman, The Sumerian Loanwords in Old-Babylonian Akkadian (Harvard Semitic Studies, issue 22; published by Scholars Press for Harvard Semitic Museum), page 66

     The symbol ? (“r” with a chevron) is used for a phoneme which sounds like Czech ? (as in Dvo?ák), i.e. a voiced alveolar flap. The presence of the chevron has no effect on the index numbers used in transliteration; cf. 2.058.

Synonyms

• (computing): wicket
• (Typographic and mathematical symbols): angle bracket

Translations

Further reading

• chevron on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• Chevron in the Encyclopædia Britannica (11th edition, 1911)

Verb

chevron (third-person singular simple present chevrons, present participle chevroning, simple past and past participle chevroned)

1. To form or be formed into chevrons
   • 1963, Lucien Victor Gewiss, "Process and Devices for Chevroning Pliable Sheet Material," US Patent 3397261 [1], page 14:

     ...the sheet to be chevroned locks itself into the furrow.

   • 1983, Allen Sillitoe, The Lost Flying Boat, ?ISBN, page 118:

     Bull fixed the claw under a batten, strained like a sailor at the capstan, shirt off, arms chevroned by elaborate tattoos.

   • 2003, Felice Picano, A House on the Ocean, a House on the Bay, ?ISBN, page 55:

     Earlier, in glaring winter daylight, I'd first noticed thin lines chevroning off the edge of each eye into the taut skin of his cheeks...

French

Etymology

From Old French, from Vulgar Latin *capri?, *capri?nem, from *capreus, cf. also caprone. Ultimately from Latin caper (“goat”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /??.v???/

Noun

chevron m (plural chevrons)

1. rafter
2. (heraldry) chevron

Related terms

• chèvre

Further reading

• “chevron” in Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

English

Etymology

Borrowed from French échelon (“rung; echelon”), from échelle (“ladder”) + -on (“suffix forming diminutives”). Échelle is derived from Latin sc?la (“ladder”), from scand? (“to ascend, climb”), from Proto-Indo-European *skend- (“to jump”).

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /????l?n/, /?e?-/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /?????l?n/
• Hyphenation: ech?e?lon

Noun

echelon (plural echelons)

1. A level or rank in an organization, profession, or society.
2. (cycling) A line of riders seeking maximum drafting in a crosswind, resulting in a diagonal line across the road.
3. (military) A formation of troops, ships, etc., in diagonal parallel rows. [from late 18th c.]

Alternative forms

• échelon

Derived terms

• echelon form
• echelon lens
• echelon parking
• rear echelon

Related terms

• en echelon

Translations

Verb

echelon (third-person singular simple present echelons, present participle echeloning, simple past and past participle echeloned)

1. (transitive, military) To form troops into an echelon.

Translations

Adjective

echelon (not comparable)

1. (linear algebra) Of a matrix: having undergone Gaussian elimination with the result that the leading coefficient or pivot (that is, the first nonzero number from the left) of a nonzero row is to the right of the pivot of the row above it, giving rise to a stepped appearance in the matrix.

Further reading

• echelon (disambiguation) on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• echelon formation on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• row echelon form on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

Anagrams

• Chelone, chelone