different between circle vs crowd

English

Etymology

From Middle English circle, cercle, from Old French cercle and Latin circulus, diminutive of Latin circus (“circle, circus”), from Ancient Greek ?????? (kírkos, “circle, ring”), related to Old English hring (“ring”). Compare also Old English ?ircul (“circle, zodiac”), which came from the same Latin source.

Pronunciation

• enPR: sûr?-k?l, IPA^(key): /?s??k?l/
  • (UK) IPA^(key): [?s??.k??]
  • (US) IPA^(key): [?s?.k??]
• Rhymes: -??(?)k?l
• Homophone: cercal
• Hyphenation: cir?cle

Noun

circle (plural circles)

1. (geometry) A two-dimensional geometric figure, a line, consisting of the set of all those points in a plane that are equally distant from a given point (center).

   Synonyms: (not in mathematical use) coil, (not in mathematical use) ring, (not in mathematical use) loop

2. A two-dimensional geometric figure, a disk, consisting of the set of all those points of a plane at a distance less than or equal to a fixed distance (radius) from a given point.

   Synonyms: disc, (in mathematical and general use) disk, (not in mathematical use; UK & Commonwealth only) round

3. Any shape, curve or arrangement of objects that approximates to or resembles the geometric figures.

   Children, please join hands and form a circle.

   1. Any thin three-dimensional equivalent of the geometric figures.

   2. A curve that more or less forms part or all of a circle.

4. A specific group of persons; especially one who shares a common interest.

   Synonyms: bunch, gang, group

   • At half-past nine on this Saturday evening, the parlour of the Salutation Inn, High Holborn, contained most of its customary visitors. […] In former days every tavern of repute kept such a room for its own select circle, a club, or society, of habitués, who met every evening, for a pipe and a cheerful glass.

   • “I don't mean all of your friends—only a small proportion—which, however, connects your circle with that deadly, idle, brainless bunch—the insolent chatterers at the opera, the gorged dowagers, […], the jewelled animals whose moral code is the code of the barnyard—!"

   • 1922, Margery Williams, The Velveteen Rabbit

     The Rabbit could not claim to be a model of anything, for he didn’t know that real rabbits existed; he thought they were all stuffed with sawdust like himself, and he understood that sawdust was quite out-of-date and should never be mentioned in modern circles.

5. The orbit of an astronomical body.
6. (cricket) A line comprising two semicircles of 30 yards radius centred on the wickets joined by straight lines parallel to the pitch used to enforce field restrictions in a one-day match.
7. (Wicca) A ritual circle that is cast three times deosil and closes three times widdershins either in the air with a wand or literally with stones or other items used for worship.
8. (South Africa) A traffic circle or roundabout.
9. (obsolete) Compass; circuit; enclosure.
10. (astronomy) An instrument of observation, whose graduated limb consists of an entire circle. When fixed to a wall in an observatory, it is called a mural circle; when mounted with a telescope on an axis and in Y's, in the plane of the meridian, a meridian or transit circle; when involving the principle of reflection, like the sextant, a reflecting circle; and when that of repeating an angle several times continuously along the graduated limb, a repeating circle.
11. A series ending where it begins, and repeating itself.

    • Thus in a circle runs the peasant's pain.

12. (logic) A form of argument in which two or more unproved statements are used to prove each other; inconclusive reasoning.
    • 1661, Joseph Glanvill, The Vanity of Dogmatizing

      That heavy bodies descend by gravity; and, again, that gravity is a quality whereby a heavy body descends, is an impertinent circle and teaches nothing.

13. Indirect form of words; circumlocution.
    • 1610, Ben Jonson, The Alchemist

      Has he given the lie, / In circle, or oblique, or semicircle.

14. A territorial division or district.

15. (in the plural) A bagginess of the skin below the eyes from lack of sleep.

Derived terms

Related terms

• circular
• circulate
• circus

Descendants

• Pitcairn-Norfolk: sirkil

Translations

Verb

circle (third-person singular simple present circles, present participle circling, simple past and past participle circled)

1. (transitive) To travel around along a curved path.

   The wolves circled the herd of deer.
2. (transitive) To surround.

   A high fence circles the enclosure.

   • 1699, William Dampier, Voyages and Descriptions

     Their heads are circled with a short turban.

   • 1798, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, The Dungeon

     So he lies, circled with evil.

3. (transitive) To place or mark a circle around.

   Circle the jobs that you are interested in applying for.

4. (intransitive) To travel in circles.

   Vultures circled overhead.

Derived terms

• circle the drain

Translations

Anagrams

• cleric

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /k?a?d/
• Rhymes: -a?d

Etymology 1

From Middle English crouden, from Old English cr?dan, from Proto-Germanic *kr?dan?, *kreudan?. Cognate with Dutch kruien.

Verb

crowd (third-person singular simple present crowds, present participle crowding, simple past and past participle crowded)

1. (intransitive) To press forward; to advance by pushing.

2. (intransitive) To press together or collect in numbers

   Synonyms: swarm, throng, crowd in

   • Images came crowding on his mind faster than he could put them into words.

3. (transitive) To press or drive together, especially into a small space; to cram.
4. (transitive) To fill by pressing or thronging together
   • 1875, William Hickling Prescott, History of the Reign of Philip the Second, King of Spain

     The balconies and verandas were crowded with spectators, anxious to behold their future sovereign.

5. (transitive, often used with "out of" or "off") To push, to press, to shove.
6. (nautical) To approach another ship too closely when it has right of way.
7. (nautical, of a square-rigged ship, transitive) To carry excessive sail in the hope of moving faster.
8. (transitive) To press by solicitation; to urge; to dun; hence, to treat discourteously or unreasonably.

Synonyms

• becrowd (dated)

Derived terms

Translations

Noun

crowd (plural crowds)

1. A group of people congregated or collected into a close body without order.
2. Several things collected or closely pressed together; also, some things adjacent to each other.

3. (with definite article) The so-called lower orders of people; the populace, vulgar.
4. A group of people united or at least characterised by a common interest.

Synonyms

• (group of things): aggregation, cluster, group, mass
• (group of people): audience, group, multitude, public, swarm, throng
• (the "lower orders" of people): everyone, general public, masses, rabble, mob, unwashed

Derived terms

Translations

Etymology 2

Inherited from Middle English crowde, from Welsh crwth or a Celtic cognate.

Noun

crowd (plural crowds)

1. (obsolete) Alternative form of crwth
   • 1600, Ben Jonson, Cynthia's Revels

     A lackey that […] can warble upon a crowd a little.

2. (now dialectal) A fiddle.

Derived terms

• crowder

Verb

crowd (third-person singular simple present crowds, present participle crowding, simple past and past participle crowded)

1. (obsolete, intransitive) To play on a crowd; to fiddle.
   • 1656, Thomas Middleton, William Rowley, and Philip Massinger, The Old Law

     Fiddlers, crowd on, crowd on.

References

crowd in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.

Anagrams

• c-word