conglomerate
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: ipa: /kənˈɡlɒm.(ə.)ɹət/
ipa: /kənˈɡlɑm.ɚ.ɪt/
ipa: /kənˈɡlɑm.ɹɪt/
ipa: /kənˈɡlɒm.əˌɹeɪt/
ipa: /kənˈɡlɑm.əˌɹeɪt/
Forms: form: conglomerates
Etymology: First attested in the second part of the 16ᵗʰ century; from Latin conglomerātus, perfect passive participle of conglomerō (“to pile into a heap, to roll together”) (see -ate (Etymology 1,2 and 3)), from con- (prefix indicating a being or bringing together of several objects) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *ḱóm (“beside, by, near, with”)) + glomerāre (from glomerō (“to pile into a heap, to make into a ball, glomerate”), from glomus (“ball of thread; ball-shaped mass”), from Proto-Indo-European *gel- (“to form into a ball; ball”)).
Senses: examples: text: They [miracles in the canonical gospels] are held, too, together by his [Jesus Christ's] strong and central personality, which does not leave them a conglomerate of marvellous anecdotes accidentally heaped together, but parts of a great organic whole, of which every part is in vital coherence with every other.
ref: 1846, Richard Chenevix Trench, “The Evangelical, Compared with Other Cycles of Miracles”, in Notes on the Miracles of Our Lord, London: John W[illiam] Parker, […], →OCLC, section 2 (The Miracles of the Apocryphal Gospels), page 39:
glosses: A cluster of heterogeneous things.
examples: text: The 2017 list includes 80 financial conglomerates with the head of group located in the European Union or European Economic Area, one financial conglomerate with the head of group in Switzerland, one in Bermuda, and two in the United States.
ref: 2017 December 5, “ESAs [European Supervisory Authorities] Publish the List of Financial Conglomerates”, in European Banking Authority, archived from the original on 24 Jul 2018:
topics: business
glosses: A corporation formed by the combination of several smaller corporations whose activities are unrelated to the corporation's primary activity.
examples: text: When sandstone is coarse-grained, it is usually called grit. If the grains are rounded, and large enough to be called pebbles, it becomes a conglomerate, or pudding-stone, which may consist of pieces of one or of many different kinds of rock. A conglomerate, therefore, is simply gravel bound together by a cement.
ref: 1838, Charles Lyell, “Aqueous Rocks—Their Composition and Forms of Stratification”, in Elements of Geology, London: John Murray, […], →OCLC, page 27:
text: Calcareous lias, slate, and trap are still to be found there, rising from layers of conglomerate like teeth out of a gum. But the pickaxe has broken up and levelled those bristling, rugged peaks which were once the homes of the eagles.
ref: 1869, Victor Hugo, [anonymous translator], “Chesil”, in The Man Who Laughs: In Two Volumes, international limited edition, volume I, Boston, Mass.: Estes and Lauriat Publishers, →OCLC, part I (The Sea and the Night), book III (The Child in the Shadow), page 156:
text: Everywhere in the river appeared a very remarkable conglomerate, and like the slate in exhibiting all the stages of formation. The matrix was the blue clay of the bank, the rubble was the gravel of the bottom.
ref: 1870, Fitz Hugh Ludlow, “Comstock’s.—A Buffalo Hunt.”, in The Heart of the Continent: A Record of Travel across the Plains and in Oregon, […], New York, N.Y.: Published by Hurd and Houghton; […], →OCLC, page 97:
text: The Middle Voltaian lies unconformably on the Lower Voltaian with a basal conglomerate that can be correlated with conglomerates of the Buem Formation. Both sets of conglomerates have been interpreted as tillites, possibly equivalent to the Infracambrian tillites of the Rokelide–Mauritanide belt west of the craton […] and in the Taoudeni Basin[…].
ref: 1985, J. B. Wright, D. A. Hastings, W. B Jones, H. R. Williams, “The Pan African of West Africa – the Eastern Domain”, in Geology and Mineral Resources of West Africa, London: George Allen & Unwin (Publishers), →DOI, →ISBN, part I (The Precambrian of West Africa), page 59, column 1:
topics: geography
geology
natural-sciences
glosses: A rock consisting of gravel or pebbles embedded in a matrix.
Derived terms: anticonglomerate
breccio-conglomerate
conglomeratelike
conglomerative
deconglomerate
fanglomerate
financial conglomerate
megaconglomerate
metaconglomerate
microconglomerate
miniconglomerate
orthoconglomerate
paraconglomerate
plastiglomerate
superconglomerate
Related terms: aggregate
composite
agglomerate