hull
/hʌl/
Word Rarity
Uncommon
Frequency: 4.06 in modern English
7
Scrabble Score
4
Letters
1
Syllables
3
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
The smallest set that possesses a particular property (such as convexity) and contains every point of A; slightly more formally, the intersection of all sets which possess the specified property and of which A is a subset.
Example Sentences
- "She sat on the back porch hulling peanuts."
- "VVhen you haue berthed or brought her [the ship] vp to the planks, vvhich are thoſe thicke timbers vvhich goeth fore and aft on each ſide, vvhereon doth lie the beames of the firſt Orlop, vvhich is the firſt floore to ſupport the plankes doth couer the Hovvle, thoſe are great croſſe timbers, that keepes the ſhip ſides aſunder, the maine beame is euer next the maine maſt, […]"
- "Deep in their hulls our deadly bullets light, / And through the yielding planks a passage find."
- "The orthogonal convex hull of an orthogonal polygon is the smallest orthogonally convex polygon that encloses the original polygon."
- "holomorphically convex hull; affine hull; injective hull"
- "We goe not, but we are carried: as things that flote, now gliding gently, now hulling violently, according as the water is, either stormy or calme."
Etymology
From Middle English hul, hulle, holle (“seed covering, hull of a ship”), from Old English hulu (“seed covering”), from Proto-Germanic *hul-, perhaps from Proto-Indo-European *ḱel- (“to cover, hide”); or possibly from Proto-Indo-European *kal- (“hard”). Compare Dutch hul (“hood”), German Hülle (“cover, wrap”), Hülse (“hull”); also Old Irish calad, calath (“hard”), Latin callus, callum (“rough skin”), Old Church Slavonic калити (kaliti, “to cool, harden”). For the sense development, compare French coque (“nutshell; ship's hull”), Ancient Greek φάσηλος (phásēlos, “bean pod; yacht”).