tower

Meanings

Noun

• A very tall iron-framed structure, usually painted red and white, on which microwave, radio, satellite, or other communication antennas are installed; mast.
• A similarly framed structure with a platform or enclosed area on top, used as a lookout for spotting fires, plane crashes, fugitives, etc.
• A water tower.
• A control tower.
• Any very tall building or structure; skyscraper.
• Any item, such as a computer case, that is usually higher than it is wide.
• An interlocking tower.
• A strong refuge; a defence.
• A tall fashionable headdress worn in the time of King William III and Queen Anne.
• High flight; elevation.
• The sixteenth trump or Major Arcana card in many Tarot decks, usually deemed an ill omen.
• The nineteenth Lenormand card, representing structure, bureaucracy, stability and loneliness.
• One who tows.

Verb

• To be very tall.
• To be high or lofty; to soar.
• To soar into.

Related

Similar words

• donjon

Origin

• and Old French tour, toer, tor; both from Latin turris ("a tower").
• Compare Scots tour, towr, towre, West Frisian toer ("tower"), Dutch toren ("tower"), German Turm ("tower"), Danish tårn ("tower"), Swedish torn ("tower"), Icelandic turn ("tower"), Welsh tŵr. tor.
• From Middle English touren, torren, torrien, from Old English *torrian, from the noun (see above).
• From tow + -er.