columbarium
/ˌkɑləmˈbɛri.əm/
Word Rarity
Very rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 1.65 in modern English
19
Scrabble Score
11
Letters
4
Syllables
9
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
A columbary, especially a large and architecturally impressive one for housing a large colony of pigeons or doves, such as those in ancien régime France.
noun
A pigeonhole in such a dovecote.
noun
A building, a vault or a similar place for the respectful and usually public storage of cinerary urns containing cremated remains.
Example Sentences
- "Meronym: pigeonhole"
- "Near-synonyms: dovecote, pigeon loft"
- "Their sides present the well-known appearance of the Roman columbaria (dove-cotes), but with the important difference, that they are adapted to contain coffins instead of urns, the holes being about 2 feet square and 6 feet deep."
- "Doves were culticly protected; great towers were built for them in which they could nest; they were called columbaria (columba is the Latin word for dove)."
- "Fish ponds were stocked with netted fish during the summer as a source of protein and dove cotes, or as the Romans called them, 'columbariums', were another."
- "We have seen how it is originally language which works on the construction of concepts, a labor taken over in later ages by science. Just as the bee simultaneously constructs cells and fills them with honey, so science works unceasingly on this great columbarium of concepts, the graveyard of perceptions."
Etymology
Origin
- Source language: Latin
Word Breakdown
- Root: columbārium
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /ˌkɑləmˈbɛri.əm/
- British English: /ˌkɒləmˈbɛəɹi.əm/