column

English Online Dictionary. What means column‎? What does column mean?

English

Etymology

From Middle English columne, columpne, columpe, borrowed from Old French columne, from Latin columna (“a column, pillar, post”), originally a collateral form of columen, contraction culmen (“a pillar, top, crown, summit”). Akin to Latin collis (“a hill”), celsus (“high”), probably to Ancient Greek κολοφών (kolophṓn, “top, summit”).

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈkɒləm/
• (General American), (Ireland) enPR: kŏlʹəm, IPA^(key): /ˈkɑləm/
• (General American, rare), (Ireland) enPR: kŏlʹjəm, IPA^(key): /ˈkɑljəm/
• Hyphenation: col‧umn
• Rhymes: -ɒləm

Noun

column (plural columns)

1. (architecture) A solid upright structure designed usually to support a larger structure above it, such as a roof or horizontal beam, but sometimes for decoration.
2. A vertical line of entries in a table, usually read from top to bottom.
3. A body of troops or army vehicles, usually strung out along a road.
5. A body of text meant to be read line by line, especially in printed material that has multiple adjacent such on a single page.

6. A unit of width, especially of advertisements, in a periodical, equivalent to the width of a usual column of text.

7. (by extension) A recurring feature in a periodical, especially an opinion piece, especially by a single author or small rotating group of authors, or on a single theme.
8. Something having similar vertical form or structure to the things mentioned above, such as a spinal column.
9. (botany) The gynostemium
10. (chemistry) An instrument used to separate the different components of a liquid or to purify chemical compounds.

Synonyms

• (upright structure): post, pillar, sile

Antonyms

• (antonym(s) of “line of table entries”): row (which is horizontal)

Hypernyms

• (upright structure): beam

Derived terms

Translations

Further reading

• “column”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• William Dwight Whitney, Benjamin E[li] Smith, editors (1911), “column”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., →OCLC.

Dutch

Etymology

Borrowed from English column, from Middle English columne, borrowed from Old French columne, from Latin columna (“a column, pillar, post”), originally a collateral form of columen, contraction culmen (“a pillar, top, crown, summit”). Doublet of kolom and colonne.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈkɔ.lʏm/
• Hyphenation: co‧lumn

Noun

column m (plural columns)

1. a recurring opinion piece in a newspaper or magazine; a column

   Hypernym: opiniestuk

   Hyponym: cursiefje

Related terms

• columnist