Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Relating to or suggestive of a Cyclops: a great Cyclopean monocle.
- adj. Very big; huge: has a cyclopean ego.
- adj. Of or constituting a primitive style of masonry characterized by the use of massive stones of irregular shape and size.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- Of or pertaining to, or exhibiting the characteristics of, any of the legendary Cyclopes. Specifically— Having a single eye in the middle of the forehead; in zoology, having a median and apparently or actually single eye. This state may be normal and permanent, as in some of the crustaceans; or normal and marking a stage of development; or monstrous, from defect of growth in the parts concerned, whereby the eyes are not separated. It occurs, for example, occasionally in the pig.
- Vast; gigantic: applied to an early style of masonry, sometimes imitated in later ages, constructed of stones either unhewn or more or less irregularly shaped and fitted together, usually polygonal, but in some more recent examples approaching regular horizontal courses, and often presenting joints of very perfect workmanship. Such masonry was fabled to be the work of the Cyclopes. It is remarkable for the immense size of the stones commonly employed, and was most frequently used for the walls of cities and fortresses. The walls of Tiryns, near Nauplia, in Greece, mentioned by Homer, are a good specimen of Cyclopean masonry. The remains of these walls consist of three courses, of which the stones, measuring from 6 to 9 feet long, from 3 to 4 feet wide, and from 2 to 3 feet deep, are rudely shaped, irregular masses piled on one another. Examples of Cyclopean work occur in Greece, Italy, Asia Minor, and elsewhere. The more primitive Cyclopean masonry in Greece, roughly built of stones entirely unhewn, the spaces between the larger stones being filled with smaller ones, is often termed Pelasgic.
Wiktionary
- adj. Suggestive of a cyclops.
- adj. masonry Fitted together of huge irregular stones.
- adj. Massive in stature.
GNU Webster's 1913
- adj. Pertaining to the Cyclops; characteristic of the Cyclops; huge; gigantic; vast and rough; massive.
WordNet 3.0
- adj. of or relating to or resembling the Cyclops
Examples
“The cyclopean has been a /shite/ chancellor, he might be okay at math but has the economic grasp of a 10 year old, he never realises the human ramifications of his policies, he is the very definition of the C word you will not let me use here.”
“The only form of the arch observed, is that called the cyclopean arch, which is made by one course of stones overlapping another, till the two walls meet, and”
“Do you ever lay awake at night dreaming of ways to introduce the word "cyclopean" into everyday speech?”
“As far as I know there is not an exact Danish match to "cyclopean" but I would say a good substitute would be "enormt.”
“It seems that this latter material was mostly used in the almost "cyclopean" defensive walls of Düzen, while smaller beige limestone bocks were used for walls of buildings.”
“Bellegra, a prehistoric fastness with some traces of "cyclopean" defences.”
“It boasts the conventional prison gateway, the solid-looking, nail-studded door, the low, worn archway which the better deserves the qualification "cyclopean," because the jailer's peephole or _judas_ looks out like a single eye from the front of the building.”
“The engineering difficulties were great, the dredging and filling a cyclopean task.”
“Colossal enterprises will be projected and carried through, and combinations of capital and federations of labor be effected on a cyclopean scale.”
“Beyond this, a cyclopean city of alien magnitude - the many million year old remnants of a race known in the pages of the fabled pnakotic manuscipts as the Elder ones.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘cyclopean’.
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Cyclo
List of words containing cylco-, -cyclo-, &c.
cyclophosphamide, cycloheptatriene, cycloalkene, cyclooctadiene, cycloolefin, cyclooctatetraene, cyclobutene, cyclopropene, cyclotrigermene, cyclotrigermenium, cyclopropenium, cyclopropenoid and 90 more...
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BIG Words
Awesome words that just mean "BIG"
gargantuan, massive, behemoth, colossal, mammoth, monumental, leviathan, immense, enormous, elephantine, astronomical, whopping and 18 more...
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Dash's list
Words of interest.
cacogen, fricatrice, destrier, swoon, multiverse, haggard, entranced, entheogen, passionate, ascendant, conciliator, bandylegged and 34 more...
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Words for Big
Words, terms and phrases that denote big, bigness, or making something bigger.
enlarge, giant, giantess, biggify, enormous, enhance, augment, whopper, swell, swollen, inflated, gigantic and 54 more...
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Invisible Man
Words culled from Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison.
sweetback, inspirit, plasticine, atoss, hyperreceptivity, laugher-at-wounds, necrophily, monopolate, aliveness, thinker-tinker, weltschmerz, klieg and 113 more...
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bintalshamsa's list
My Favorite Words
weltschmerz, perspicacity, idée fixe, invigilator, salubrious, tchotchke, ex nihilo, invidious, malapropism, naïve, sardonic, elide and 1402 more...
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je les adore!
fusillade, foal, celestial, abattoir, byzantium, berlin, casablanca, babylon, balkans, albion, avalon, between the devil... and 471 more...
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ADW1
obdurate, obstinate, behest, injunction, enjoin, circumspect, ensconce, discursive, lugubrious, doleful, somber, ken and 2476 more...
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Castles and Keeps
Shamelessly ripped off from this site and others (to be named hereinafter). (Fair warning: for my own edification, I may add definitions/comments from the site, but you might want to just go there ...
abutment, adulterine, allure, angle-spur, apse, arbalest, arbalestier, arbalist, arcade, arch, armoury, arrow slit and 410 more...
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Myth
augean, bacchanal, cereal, cimmerian, cupidity, cyclopean, mercurial, jovial, hermetic, halcyon, titanic, furious and 105 more...
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learning
A list of words whose meanings I am learning, either because a) I don't know the meaning b) I know the meaning, but could stand to better appreciate certain inflections or secondary meanings or c) ...
louche, educe, loam, cob, sclerotic, palliate, axial, syndicalist, ecumenical, sally, fatuous, parvenu and 1381 more...
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librarygoblin's words
crystal, ghost, mist, snow, labyrinth, citadel, tomb, mystery, arcane, conundrum, echo, dynamo and 389 more...
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1906 Railway Cipher Code
Terms from the Standard Cipher Code of the American Railway Association, 1906. The terms were shorthand for common phrases used in telegraphic communications between station agents and Railway Asso...
abetting, abdominal, abiology, ablative, abnormal, abominate, aboveboard, abrasive, absinth, abstinent, accursed, acetate and 212 more...
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5-0
Hecko, words! I’m so happy I’ve found you. I want to keep you all and never want to lose you again. I hope you like it here.
amscray, thistledown, tine, tinsel, pungent, snarl, wail, lanky, viscid, dawdle, luminous, stow and 2719 more...
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Clearinghouse
For stuff to simply reside.
calcar, pinion, espadrille, antipodes, peregrine, cormorant, tanager, vireo, farrago, undervest, passerine, oscine and 881 more...
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Adjectival Arcana
A roster of adjectives that infrequently surface in typical conversation and writing. Many are dredged from scientific or other technical jargon or sieved from examples of disused archaic forms.
unitegmic, acaulescent, reticuloendothelial, ingressive, uniate, acanthopterygian, ossific, epiphysial, perivisceral, acœlomatous, cestoid, acælomate and 7756 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for cyclopean.

hernesheir "Will not need wrecking crew(s)" in the shorthand code of railway telegraphers. --US Railway Association, Standard Cipher Code, 1906. Jan 21, 2013
vanishedone In his introduction to The Dream Cycle of H.P. Lovecraft Neil Gaiman talks about Lovecraft-inspired stories he's written and says of one of them - I quote from memory - that 'you can tell it's Lovecraftian, because I use the word cyclopean in it'. Oct 23, 2007