fountain
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: ipa: /ˈfaʊn.tɪn/
ipa: [ˈfaʊn.tn̩]
ipa: [ˈfaʊn.ʔn̩]
rhymes: -aʊntɪn
Forms: form: fountains
Etymology: From Middle English [Term?]; from Old French fontaine (whence modern fontaine); from Late Latin fontana, from Latin fontanus, fontaneus, adjectives from fons (“source, spring”).
Senses: examples: text: A little fountaine became a riuer, and there was light, & the Sunne, and much water: this riuer is Eſther, whō the King married and made Queene.
ref: 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Esther 10:6:
synonyms: fount
syke
wellspring
qualifier: originally
glosses: A natural source of water; a spring.
examples: text: His house is right beside that fountain on Street 15.
glosses: An artificial, usually ornamental, water feature (usually in a garden or public place) consisting of one or more streams of water originating from a statue or other structure.
examples: text: As they turned into Hertford Street they startled a robin from the poet's head on a barren fountain, and he fled away with a cameo note.
ref: 1922, Michael Arlen, “Ep./4/2”, in “Piracy”: A Romantic Chronicle of These Days, →OL:
glosses: The structure from which an artificial fountain can issue.
examples: text: They heard her rouse the sleeping servant, and with her enter the kitchen; then the noise of a fire being lighted and the fountain being filled came to the watchers.
ref: 1907, Barbara Baynton, edited by Sally Krimmer and Alan Lawson, Human Toll (Portable Australian Authors: Barbara Baynton), St Lucia: University of Queensland Press, published 1980, page 208:
glosses: A reservoir from which liquid can be drawn.
examples: text: Nothing will pleaſe ſome Men, but Books ſtuff’d with Antiquity, groaning under the weight of Learned Quotations drawn from the Fountains: And what is all this but Pilfering.
ref: 1700, Tom Brown, Amusements Serious and Comical, calculated for the Meridian of London, page 5:
text: My lighter moods are like to these,
⁠That out of words a comfort win;
⁠But there are other griefs within,
And tears that at their fountain freeze; […]
ref: 1850, [Alfred, Lord Tennyson], “Canto XX”, in In Memoriam, London: Edward Moxon, […], →OCLC, page 33:
glosses: A source or origin of a flow (e.g., of favors or knowledge).
examples: text: Crest : A boar's head couped gold semy of fountains armed gules. Motto : REMIS VELISQUE. Granted by the College of Arms 1966.
ref: 1928, New England Historic Genealogical Society. Committee on Heraldry, A Roll of Arms:
text: Argent, seme of fountains on a chief azure a Lorraine cross and an oak leaf of the first. Crest, None. Motto, Able and Ready. The blue of the shield represents Infantry. The fountains are emblematic of Arizona,[…]
ref: 1953, United States. Department of the Army. Office of Military History, The Army Lineage Book, page 828:
topics: government
heraldry
hobbies
lifestyle
monarchy
nobility
politics
glosses: A roundel barry wavy argent and azure.
topics: arts
hobbies
juggling
lifestyle
performing-arts
sports
glosses: A juggling pattern typically done with an even number of props where each prop is caught by the same hand that throws it.
examples: text: He takes out a soup bowl, fills it with Pepsi from the fountain, and places it carefully on the counter in front of the boy. “That'll be a quarter,” he says professionally.
ref: 2014, Danielle Sarver Coombs, Bob Batchelor, We Are What We Sell: How Advertising Shapes American Life... and Always Has, page 222:
text: A Sproke was a soft drink Gloria and I had created with Jimbo’s help at the Banana Shack. It was basically fountain Coke mixed with fountain Sprite.
ref: 2018, Chris Grabenstein, Sandapalooza Shake-up, New York: Random House, →ISBN, page 67:
glosses: A soda fountain.
glosses: A drink poured from a soda fountain, or the cup it is poured into.
glosses: A ground-based firework that projects sparks similar to a water fountain.
examples: text: Travellers over the London & North Western main line in bygone days will need no reminder of the pattering of cinders on the carriage roofs, the fountains of sparks from the chimneys at night and the distance from which the exhaust of approaching locomotives could be heard, due to the fierceness of their blast in such conditions.
ref: 1962 June, Cecil J. Allen, “Locomotive Running Past and Present”, in Modern Railways, page 399:
glosses: Anything that resembles a fountain in operation.
Derived terms: air fountain
drinking fountain
fire fountain
fountain apple moss
fountain chair
fountain code
fountain drink
fountaineer
fountain effect
fountaingrass
fountainhead
fountain lamp
fountainless
fountainlet
fountainlike
fountain of youth
fountainous
fountain pen
fountain pressure
Fountains Earth
fountain shell
fountain water
fountainwise
Heron's fountain
ice fountain
ink fountain
kugel fountain
soda fountain
soda fountain chair
water fountain
Related terms: font