Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. Architecture An eyelike opening or ornament, especially:
- n. A round window.
- n. A circular opening at the apex of a dome.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. In anatomy, the eye; an eye; specifically, a compound eye.
- n. In botany, an eye; a leaf-bud.
- n. A European plant, Inula Oculus-Christi, having astringent properties.
- n. In architecture, a circular window, usually a small one without tracery or other special subdivision; also an opening at the summit of a dome-shaped vault.
Wiktionary
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. An eye.
- n. (Arch.) A round window, usually a small one.
- n. (Bot.) A leaf bud.
WordNet 3.0
- n. the organ of sight
Etymologies
- From Latin oculus ("eye"). (Wiktionary)
- Medieval Latin, from Latin, eye. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“Skidmore, Owings & Merrill/John Blaustein An almond-shaped skylight or "oculus" is at the top of the building, through which sunlight shines in different patterns throughout the day.”
The Wall Street Journal: Inside Oakland's Cathedral of Christ the Light
“oculus" was sometimes applied to things that were seen to resemble eyes, and one such thing was the bud of a plant.”
“I evoked the oculus in the coffered dome, an engineering feat as well as a symbolic gesture of colossal proportions.”
The Huffington Post: Alla Kazovsky: Orchestrating Experience
“What you notice as you approach Centra from the Metropark train station, a five- minute walk down the road, is its new fourth floor, which cantilevers out over a plaza and completes the square of the "L", leaving an oculus in the center.”
“But he is most jazzed by the atmospheric breakfast parlor, a domed lair that's dramatically lit by concealed skylights and a stained-glass oculus.”
“The walls rise to nearly 100 feet before embracing a large almond shaped ‘oculus’ window.”
“St. John Cantius explains: In Rome on Pentecost, in the Pantheon (i.e. the minor basilica called S. Maria ad martyres) there is a beautiful and ancient custom of dropping rose petals through the circular oculus opening at the top of the dome.”
“May 31, 2009: rose petals rain through the open oculus of Rome's Pantheon (the Basilica of Sancta Maria ad Martyres) during their annual celebration on the Solemnity of Pentecost while the Veni Sancte Spiritus is chanted.”
Pentecost Sunday at the Basilica of Santa Maria ad Martyres (the Pantheon)
“And OD is short for oculus dexter, or right eye, not for overdose.”
“The rotunda's ideal proportions; the weight of the dome lifted above one's shoulders, suspended in air by icy mathematic precision; the oculus letting in the rain and the searing Roman sunlight; the coolness and shade that nonetheless prevails.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘oculus’.
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Interesting words
A list of words that are odd or words that I have looked up.
concupiscence, brize, scree, scoria, forestaff, spanaemia, valetudinarianism, distasture, pyrethrum, laudanum, gentian, bicameral and 11184 more...
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phrontistery - o
from phrontistery.info
oakum, oakus, oast, obambulate, obdormition, obduracy, obedible, obedientiary, obeism, obeliscolychny, obelize, obelus and 504 more...
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Palynology
List of terms used in the study and classification of pollen and spores - both fossil and modern.
tetrad, abporal, ectoaperture, lacuna, grain, spore, lophate, acalymmate, monad, polyad, hexad, calymmate and 513 more...
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oculi-, oculo-
eye
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FTL
Words listed first by me that don't belong in any other list.
licit, precis, mnemosyne, badinage, mariposa, lepidoptera, coruscation, poignant, meme, oxymoron, xenophobia, asterism and 128 more...
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savage215's Words
pipe, yankee, knickerbocker, tennis, plasma, magma, volcano, car, truck, television, tv, word and 445 more...
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Holes
judas, judas-hole, hole, creephole, pinhole, spy-eye, blowhole, breathing-hole, spiracle, touchhole, mouth, cakehole and 166 more...
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Words of the Day
glabella, chirotony, nook-shotten, crapehanger, filemot, swirlie, egosurf, lexiphanicism, Ruritanian, stichometry, chrononaut, faldstool and 1991 more...
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You May Tell Yourself, "This Is Not M...
.
cornice, balustrade, dado, bargeboard, buttress, clerestory, crenellation, cupola, corbel, dentil, vergeboard, quatrefoil and 101 more...
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inspired by science
noctilucent, jamais vu, l'esprit de l'esc..., tinnitus, phosphene, chirality, holographic princ..., mammatus, event horizon, analemma, singularity, tidal locking and 8 more...
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oxyrhynchus
chi rho, logos, synoptic, flying buttress, duomo, reliquary, apse, nave, transept, basilica, cloister, clerestory and 42 more...
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vipassana's list
Some of my faves
dastard, perambulatory, finial, pud, oculus, asshat, crepuscular, soupcon, sinecure, peripatetic, mneme, incarnadine and 11 more...
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sesquipidalian
words new to me
spicilege, eloge, rhapsode, florilege, oculus, redivivus, cantus, sharawaggi
Tweets
Looking for tweets for oculus.
fiveleg I'm not sure as I read this some years ago, and it may have been in a book on Neo-Classicism by Mario Praz, but when commenting on the oculus in the Pantheon, it was referred to as the "Eye of God". Nov 25, 2012
whichbe A round, central opening or "eye" in a dome. (From ArtLex) Jun 4, 2008