English Dictionary |
EPICYCLE
Pronunciation (US): | (GB): |
Dictionary entry overview: What does epicycle mean?
• EPICYCLE (noun)
The noun EPICYCLE has 1 sense:
1. a circle that rolls around (inside or outside) another circle; generates an epicycloid or hypocycloid
Familiarity information: EPICYCLE used as a noun is very rare.
Dictionary entry details
Sense 1
Meaning:
A circle that rolls around (inside or outside) another circle; generates an epicycloid or hypocycloid
Classified under:
Nouns denoting two and three dimensional shapes
Hypernyms ("epicycle" is a kind of...):
circle (ellipse in which the two axes are of equal length; a plane curve generated by one point moving at a constant distance from a fixed point)
Derivation:
epicyclic; epicyclical (of or relating to an epicycle)
Context examples
But when it came to almagest and astrolabe, the counting of figures and reckoning of epicycles, away would go her thoughts to horse and hound, and a vacant eye and listless face would warn the teacher that he had lost his hold upon his scholar.
(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
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