| 释义 |
▪ I. keystone, n.|ˈkiːstəʊn|
1. a. The stone at the summit of an arch, which, being the last put in, is looked upon as locking the whole together.
a1637B. Jonson Underwoods, Misc. Poems xxx. To Sir E. Sackville, 'Tis the last key-stone That makes the arch. 1703Moxon Mech. Exerc. 279 If you will add a Keystone..to the Arch..let the breadth of the upper part of the Keystone be the height of the Arch. 1790Burns Tam o' Shanter 206 Now, do thy speedy utmost, Meg, And win the key-stane of the brig. 1851Ruskin Stones Ven. I. x. §4 One voussoir is as much a keystone as another; only people usually call the stone which is last put in the keystone; and that one happens generally to be at the top or middle of the arch. 1858Mrs. Oliphant Laird Norlaw III. 272 The narrow door, with some forgotten noble's sculptured shield upon its keystone.
b. fig. Something occupying a position compared to that of a keystone in an arch.
1641J. Jackson True Evang. T. iii. 182 Christian Society is..like stones in an arch,..Christ himselfe being the key⁓stone. 1790Burns Tam o' Shanter 69 That hour, o' night's black arch the key-stane. 1839Bailey Festus i. (1852) 10 The sun, centre and sire of light, The keystone of the world-built arch of Heaven. 1866Howells Venet. Life (1883) I. xiii. 245 At the other end of the saloon sat one of the fathers, the plump key-stone of an arch of comfortable young students.
c. esp. The central principle of a system, course of action, etc., upon which all the rest depends.
1817Coleridge Biog. Lit. 96 Religion, as both the corner stone, and the key-stone of morality. 1832Lewis Use & Ab. Pol. Terms xvii. 163 The keystone on which all government must ultimately rest. 1849Macaulay Hist. Eng. vii. II. 166 The tenet of predestination was the keystone of his religion. 1876Rogers Pol. Econ. ix. (ed. 3) 108 The principle of unlimited liability is the keystone of the system.
d. ellipt. = Keystone State (see sense 5). Also attrib. U.S.
[1803in H. M. Jenkins Pennsylvania (1903) II. xii. 316 Pennsylvania is the Keystone of the democratic arch.] 1844Congress. Globe 4 June 662/3 The old Key-stone has never furnished the Union with either President or Vice President. 1948Time 21 June 22/3 The control of keystone Pennsylvania was one of the big question marks of the convention.
2. A bond-stone.
1823P. Nicholson Pract. Build. 339 Key-Stones, a term frequently used for bond-stones.
3. In chromolithography: see quot.
1875Ure's Dict. Arts III. 135 A drawing of the subject, in outline,..is made..when transferred to a stone, this drawing is called the keystone, and it serves as a guide to all the others, for it must be transferred to as many different stones as there are colours in the subject. 1889Pall Mall G. 23 Jan. 3/1 ‘Offsets’..are tracings of those portions of matter in the keystone which are to go in each colour, an offset for the red, one for the blue, and so on.
4. A block of cast-iron used to fill up certain spaces in a Scotch lead smelting furnace.
1857Tomlinson in Encycl. Brit. (ed. 8) XIII. 300/1 (Lead) The space at each end of the fore-stone is closed by a cube of cast-iron called a key-stone: two similar stones fill up the space between the fore-stone and the back part of the furnace.
5. a. attrib. and Comb., as keystone-mask; keystone effect, in Cinemat., the formation of a trapezial projected image as a result of the line of projection not being normal to the screen; a similar distortion of a television picture in which a rectangular object gives a trapezial image; keystone-mill, a kind of mill used for grinding tanning materials; Keystone State U.S., popular appellation of Pennsylvania, as being the seventh or central one of the original thirteen states.
1914J. B. Rathbun Motion Picture Making vi. 135 With the projector installed at one side of the screen, the keystone effect will be horizontal instead of vertical. 1940D. G. Fink Princ. Television Engin. iv. 142 When such a scanned image is reproduced in the receiver, all the picture elements in the lower lines are spread out too far relative to those in the top line. This is the so-called keystone effect. 1967Electronics 6 Mar. 79/1 (Advt.), The electron gun is set at an angle to the phosphor and the deflection system compensates for keystone effects.
1890Daily News 26 Nov. 7/3 The quite famous sculptured *keystone-masks on the east and west sides of the central arch of Henley Bridge.
1881Spon's Dict. Indust. Arts 1227 The well known American ‘*keystone’ mill.
1836Southern Lit. Messenger II. 277 The little German farmer..in the Key Stone State. 1948Daily Ardmoreite (Ardmore, Okla.) 27 Apr. 6/2 Republican aspirants matched strength in the politically important keystone state.
b. Used attrib. (with capital initial) in allusion to the slapstick comedy films produced by the Keystone film company, formed by ‘Mack Sennett’ in 1912; esp. of films featuring the ‘Keystone Cops’, a group of bumbling policemen. Hence Keystones, slang for ‘police’.
1913Writer's Mag. Nov. 188/2 If you have never written burlesque or vaudeville material..you will do well to watch a dozen of the Keystone comedies. 1918R. H. Knyvett Over There 54 We received at this time the nickname ‘Keystone soldiers’, some genial ass conceiving that we looked as funny as the Keystone police. 1935A. J. Pollock Underworld Speaks 66/2 Keystone, a special, uniformed police officer. 1964W. Markfield To Early Grave x. 168 He was straddling the running board like a Keystone cop. 1967[see James Bond]. 1969J. Wainwright Big Tickle 162 Get the keystones in the act. They watch. We perform. 1971A. Hunter Gently at Gallop i. 6 The local Keystones move in demanding alibis. 1974N. Freeling Dressing of Diamond 107 The extreme infantilism of mentalities unable to distinguish between the Keystone Kops and a shattered child.
Hence ˈkeystoned a., having a keystone.
1887T. Hardy Woodlanders I. iv. 52 Under that keystoned doorway.
▪ II. keystone, v. Television.|ˈkiːstəʊn|
[f. the n.]
trans. To subject to a keystone effect (see keystone 5). Hence ˈkeystoning vbl. n.
1940Zworykin & Morton Television xv. 473 If the complete sawtooth..is a modulation, the shape will be keystoned. 1940D. G. Fink Princ. Television Engin. iv. 142 (caption) Trapezoidal distortion (‘keystoning’) of scanning pattern in the iconoscope. 1951S. Deutsch Theory & Design Television Receivers xv. 495 This characteristic is counteracted by keystoning the CRT picture in the opposite sense by means of two permanent magnets. 1972R. G. Middleton Transistor Television Servicing Guide (rev. ed.) vii. 86 A thermistor in the vertical-deflection coil circuit will occasionally..develop an abnormal resistance characteristic that will produce keystoning. |