cupola

English
A cupola atop Cardiff's city hall
Basic cupola furnace

Etymology

Borrowed from Italian cupola, from Latin cūpula (“little tub”); from Latin cūpa, cuppa (“cup”); named for its resemblance to a cup turned over.[1]

Pronunciation
  • (UK, US) IPA(key): /ˈkjuːpələ/
  • Audio (Southern England)(file)
  • (US) IPA(key): /ˈkupələ/
  • (US, dialectal) IPA(key): /ˈkjupəloʊ/ (see cupalo)

Noun

cupola (plural cupolas or cupolae)

  1. (architecture) A dome-shaped ornamental structure located on top of a larger roof or dome.
    • 1886, Robert Louis Stephenson, The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde:
      the light falling dimly through the foggy cupola.
    • 2012, Andrew Martin, Underground Overground: A passenger's history of the Tube, Profile Books, →ISBN, page 101:
      The stations on the City & South London were small but pretty, with cupolas to accommodate the winding gear of the small and claustrophobic hydraulic lifts.
  2. (military, railroad) A small turret, usually on a hatch of an armoured fighting vehicle.
  3. (geology) An upward-projecting mass of plutonic rock extending from a larger batholith.
  4. (geometry) A solid formed by joining two polygons, one (the base) with twice as many edges as the other, by an alternating band of isosceles triangles and rectangles.
  5. A type of furnace used for smelting.
    • 2008, Matthew Stein, When Technology Fails, →ISBN:
      The cupola has a small cylindrical chimney-like bore that is lined with a refractory material.
    • 2009, S.K. Garg, Comprehensive Workshop Technology, →ISBN, page 260:
      Cast iron produced in a cupola possesses the following advantages : The cost of melting is low. The control of chemical composition is better. Temperature control is easier. Molten metals can be tapped from the cupola at regular intervals.
  6. (anatomy) A small cap over a structure that is shaped like a dome or inverted cup.
    the posterior cupola of the cartilaginous nasal capsule
    • 1937, Sir Gavin De Beer, The Development of the Vertebrate Skull, page 180:
      From each anterior cupola there projects forwards the processus prenasalis lateralis inferior.
    • 2015, Charles E. Smith, Trauma Anesthesia, →ISBN, page 85:
      The cupola of the lung is mostly medial and posterior to the vein as it begins to course deeper into the thorax (Fig. 5.7).
  7. (railways, Canada, dated) a small viewing window in the top of the caboose for looking over the train, or the part of the caboose where one looks through this window.

Derived terms

Translations

Further reading

References
  1. “cupola”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.

Anagrams

Italian

Etymology

From Latin cupula.

Pronunciation
  • IPA(key): /ˈku.po.la/
  • Rhymes: -upola
  • Hyphenation: cù‧po‧la

Noun

cupola f (plural cupole)

  1. (architecture) dome, vault
  2. cupola

Derived terms

Descendants

Further reading
  • cupola in Collins Italian-English Dictionary
  • cupola in Treccani.it – Vocabolario Treccani on line, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana

Anagrams
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