central
Language: English
Part of speech: adj
Pronunciation: ipa: /ˈsɛntɹəl/
rhymes: -ɛntɹəl
Forms: form: more central
form: most central
form: centralmost
form: centremost
form: centermost
Etymology: Borrowed from Latin centrālis, from centrum (“centre”), from Ancient Greek κέντρον (kéntron); by surface analysis, centre + -al.
Senses: examples: text: Egyption Thebes; / Tyre by the margin of the sounding waves; / Palmyra, central in the Desert, fell; / And the Arts died by which they had been raised.
ref: 1814, William Wordsworth, “The Parsonage”, in The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth, volume V, London: Longman, published 1827, page 340:
text: The plantoid[…]will have a central stem containing a reservoir of liquid plastic of a sort that can be frozen by ultraviolet light. Half a dozen cylindrical roots will branch off this stem, and the plastic will flow through these from the reservoir to the tip. As in a real root, the tip will be a specialised structure.
ref: 2013 July 27, “Putting down roots”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8846:
text: The network had no central ownership or controller; and it did only one thing – transfer data packets from one edge of the network to their destination at another edge.
ref: 2024 May 4, John Naughton, “The internet is in decline – it needs rewilding”, in The Guardian:
glosses: Being in the centre.
glosses: Having or containing the centre of something.
examples: text: Cleverley was a central figure as England took the lead inside three minutes. He saw his shot handled by Moldovan defender Simion Bulgaru and Lampard drilled home the penalty in trademark fashion.
ref: 2012 September 7, Phil McNulty, “Moldova 0-5 England”, in BBC Sport:
text: Passengers crowd in the main concourse at London Euston on January 28 2017, before boarding West Coast Main Line services. The urgent need to relieve congestion and improve reliability on the WCML remains central in the recently published Full Business Case for HS2.
ref: 2020 May 6, Jim Steer, “Full Business Case offers fresh insight into HS2's prospects”, in Rail, page 51, photo caption:
synonyms: dominant
main
principal
glosses: Being very important, or key to something.
topics: anatomy
medicine
sciences
glosses: Exerting its action towards the peripheral organs.
topics: algebra
mathematics
sciences
glosses: Belong or relating to the center of an algebraic structure.
Of an element of an algebraic structure: which commutes with all other elements under multiplication
topics: algebra
mathematics
sciences
glosses: Belong or relating to the center of an algebraic structure.
Of a unital algebra over a field: whose center is exactly equal to the image of the base field
Derived terms: acentral
anterocentral
Australian Central Daylight Time
bicentral
caudocentral
central adiposity
Central African Federation
Central Africa Time
Central American bushmaster
Central Anatolia
central angle
central bank
Central Bedfordshire
Central Bohemian Region
Central Bridge
central business district
central canal
central casting
central chimpanzee
Central City
central city
Central Coast
Central Coaster
central committee
central cord syndrome
central core disease
Central Daylight Time
Central Desert
central determiner
central dogma
central door locking
Central Elgin
Central European
Central European Midsummer Time
Central Europe Time
central excise
central fire
Central Frontenac
Central Goldfields
central government
central heating
Central Highlands
Central Huron
Centralia
centralisation
centralise
centralish
centrality
centralize
Central Kootenay
central limit theorem
central location test
central locking
centrally
Central Manitoulin
Central Min
central moment
centralmost
central nervous system
centralness
Central Okanagan
Central Otago
central pain syndrome
Central Papua
central pawn
Central Plain
central planning
central processing unit
Central Provinces
central reservation
central retinal artery
central sensitisation
central simple algebra
central spindle
central sulcus
central tendency
central vacuum
Central West
costocentral
craniocentral
decentral
dorsocentral
epicentral
excentral
frontocentral
Guinzadan Central
hypercentral
intercentral
Mashonaland Central
measure of central tendency
mesiocentral
metacentral
mid-central
midcentral
monocentral
multicentral
neurocentral
noncentral
northcentral
orthocentral
Pahina Central
paracentral
parietocentral
pericentral
pluricentral
Poblacion Central
polycentral
postcentral
posteriocentral
posterocentral
proximocentral
quasicentral
San Nicolas Central
semicentral
southcentral
South Central
subcentral
supracentral
temporocentral
tricentral
uncentral
unicentral
Related terms: center