different between monolith vs cacuminous

English

Etymology

The noun is borrowed from French monolithe (“object made from a single block of stone”), from Middle French monolythe (“made from a single block of stone”) (rare), and from their etymon Latin monolithus (“made from a single block of stone”), from Ancient Greek ????????? (monólithos, “made from a single block of stone”), from ????- (mono-, prefix meaning ‘alone; single’) (from ????? (mónos, “alone; only, unique”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *mey- (“little, small”)) + ????? (líthos, “a stone; stone as a substance”); analysable as mono- +? -lith. The English word is cognate with German monolith (“made from a single block of stone”).

The verb is derived from the noun.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /?m?n?l??/, /?m?nl??/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /?m?n??l??/
• Hyphenation: mo?no?lith

Noun

monolith (plural monoliths)

1. (also attributively) A large, single block of stone which is a natural feature; or a block of stone or other similar material used in architecture and sculpture, especially one carved into a monument in ancient times.

   Antonym: polylith
2. (also attributively and figuratively) Anything massive, uniform, and unmovable, especially a towering and impersonal cultural, political, or social organization or structure.

   Antonym: chimera
3. (chemistry) A substrate having many tiny channels that is cast as a single piece, which is used as a stationary phase for chromatography, as a catalytic surface, etc.
4. (Britain, horticulture) A dead tree whose height and size have been reduced by breaking off or cutting its branches.

Derived terms

• monolithal
• monolithic
• monolithically
• monolithism

Related terms

• megalith

Translations

Verb

monolith (third-person singular simple present monoliths, present participle monolithing, simple past and past participle monolithed)

1. (transitive) To create (something) as, or convert (one or more things) into, a monolith.
   1. (construction) To cast (one or more concrete components) in a single piece with no joints.
   2. (Britain, horticulture) To reduce the height and size of (a dead tree) by breaking off or cutting its branches.

Translations

References

Further reading

• monolith on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• monolith (disambiguation) on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

English

Etymology

cac?min- (the stem of the Latin cac?men (“tree-top”)) + -ous

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) enPR: k?kyo?o?m?n?s, IPA^(key): /k??kju?m?n?s/

Adjective

cacuminous (not comparable)

1. (rare) Having a pyramidal top.

   Cleopatra’s Needles are three cacuminous monoliths first erected in Ancient Egypt over a thousand years before the birth of Christ.

   • 1597: John Hoskyns’ “A Tuftafffeta Speech”, printed in Sir Benjamin Rudyerd’s 1660 Le Prince d’Amour, and reprinted on page 100 of Louise Brown Osborn’s 1937 The Life, Letters, and Writings of John Hoskyns, 1566–1638 (published by the Yale University Press)

     [A]s the snow advanced vpon y? poynts vertical of cacuminous mountains dissolveth and discoagulateth it self into humorous liquidity[.]

   • 1834: James Atkinson, Medical Bibliography, s.v. “Acerbi Joseph”, page 165

     Equally so as it ha been in his own, over the estuous rivers of Lapland, or its frozen and cacuminous mountains;

   • ante 1879: Mortimer Collins, Pen Sketches by a Vanished Hand, volume 1, page 248

     Luminous books (not voluminous) To read under beech-trees cacuminous.

Related terms

• cacuminal
• cacuminate
• cacumination

Translations

References

• “cacuminous, a.” listed in the Oxford English Dictionary [2nd Ed.; 1989]