Library / English Dictionary

    FOUNTAIN

    Pronunciation (US): Play  (GB): Play

     I. (noun) 

    Sense 1

    Meaning:

    A plumbing fixture that provides a flow of waterplay

    Synonyms:

    fount; fountain

    Classified under:

    Nouns denoting man-made objects

    Hypernyms ("fountain" is a kind of...):

    plumbing fixture (a fixture for the distribution and use of water in a building)

    Sense 2

    Meaning:

    An artificially produced flow of waterplay

    Synonyms:

    fountain; jet

    Classified under:

    Nouns denoting man-made objects

    Hypernyms ("fountain" is a kind of...):

    flow; flowing (the motion characteristic of fluids (liquids or gases))

    Sense 3

    Meaning:

    A structure from which an artificially produced jet of water arisesplay

    Classified under:

    Nouns denoting man-made objects

    Hypernyms ("fountain" is a kind of...):

    construction; structure (a thing constructed; a complex entity constructed of many parts)

    Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "fountain"):

    bubbler; drinking fountain; water fountain (a public fountain to provide a jet of drinking water)

    Sense 4

    Meaning:

    A natural flow of ground waterplay

    Synonyms:

    fountain; natural spring; outflow; outpouring; spring

    Classified under:

    Nouns denoting natural objects (not man-made)

    Hypernyms ("fountain" is a kind of...):

    formation; geological formation ((geology) the geological features of the earth)

    Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "fountain"):

    Fountain of Youth (a fountain described in folk tales as able to make people young again)

    geyser (a spring that discharges hot water and steam)

    hot spring; thermal spring (a natural spring of water at a temperature of 70 F or above)

    Credits

     Context examples: 

    Every shadowy nook, where seats invited one to stop and rest, was a mass of bloom, every cool grotto had its marble nymph smiling from a veil of flowers and every fountain reflected crimson, white, or pale pink roses, leaning down to smile at their own beauty.

    (Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

    Soon I came upon the source of it, for in the center of a small clearing I found a lake—or a pool, rather, for it was not larger than the basin of the Trafalgar Square fountain—of some black, pitch-like stuff, the surface of which rose and fell in great blisters of bursting gas.

    (The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

    Volcanoes were first discovered on Io in 1979, and subsequent studies by NASA's Galileo spacecraft, which first flew by Io in 1996, and ground-based telescopes show that eruptions and lava fountains occur constantly, creating rivers and lakes of lava.

    (A Hellacious Two Weeks on Jupiter's Moon Io, NASA)

    Fancy me yielding and melting, as I am doing: human love rising like a freshly opened fountain in my mind and overflowing with sweet inundation all the field I have so carefully and with such labour prepared—so assiduously sown with the seeds of good intentions, of self-denying plans.

    (Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

    These jets then spout from the black hole in a spectacular galactic fountain.

    (ALMA and MUSE Detect Galactic Fountain, ESO)

    But a fountain of blood was gushing forth.

    (The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)

    The gushing fountains which sparkle in the sun, must not be stopped in mere caprice; the oasis in the desert of Sahara must not be plucked up idly.

    (David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

    From every hill slope came the trickle of running water, the music of unseen fountains.

    (The Call of the Wild, by Jack London)

    When I happened to behold the reflection of my own form in a lake or fountain, I turned away my face in horror and detestation of myself, and could better endure the sight of a common Yahoo than of my own person.

    (Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

    Here Meg meant to have a fountain, shrubbery, and a profusion of lovely flowers, though just at present the fountain was represented by a weather-beaten urn, very like a dilapidated slopbowl, the shrubbery consisted of several young larches, undecided whether to live or die, and the profusion of flowers was merely hinted by regiments of sticks to show where seeds were planted.

    (Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)


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