| 释义 |
circumscribe, v.|sɜːkəmˈskraɪb|
[ad. L. circumscrībĕre to draw a line round, encompass, limit, confine, etc., f. circum around + scrībĕre to make lines, write. Cf. the earlier circumscrive.]
1. trans. To draw a line round; to encompass with (or as with) a bounding line, to form the boundary of, to bound.
1578Banister Hist. Man i. 9 The bones of the temples..are equally circumscribed with scalie Agglutinations. 1613R. C. Table Alph. (ed. 3), Circumscribe, to compasse about with a line. 1753Hogarth Anal. Beauty vii. 37 The straight line and the circular line..bound and circumscribe all visible objects. 1823Rutter Fonthill 48 The rich and glorious landscape, circumscribed by no common horizon.
b. To encompass (without a line), to encircle.
1603B. Jonson Sejanus v. x, They that..thronged to circumscribe him. 1649Jer. Taylor Gt. Exemp. i. 81 Old Simeon did comprehend and circumscribe in his armes him that filled all the world. 1649G. Daniel Trinarch., Hen. IV, cclix, The Little World thus Circumscribes a Nation. 1719De Foe Crusoe (1840) I. xi. 185, I was alone, circumscribed by the..ocean. 1796Morse Amer. Geog. I. 63 That collection of air..circumscribing the earth, is..the atmosphere.
2. To mark out or lay down the limits of; to enclose within limits, limit, bound, confine (usually fig.); esp. to confine within narrow limits, to restrict the free or extended action of, to hem in, restrain, abridge.
1529More Dial. Heresy i. Wks. 121/2 He is not comprehensyble nor circumscribed no where. 1602Shakes. Ham. i. iii. 22 Therefore must his choyce be circumscrib'd. 1712Addison Spect. No. 471 ⁋5 Who can imagine that the Existence of a Creature is to be circumscribed by Time..whose Thoughts are not? 1835I. Taylor Spir. Despot. §3. 94 Everything was..circumscribed and fixed in their theology. 1874Blackie Self Cult. 67 A man..should not circumscribe his activity by any inflexible fence of rigid rules.
b. To mark off, to define logically.
1846Mill Logic Introd. §1 The most correct..mode of circumscribing them by a general description. 1855Bain Senses & Int. ii. iii. (1864) 255 The Appetites commonly recognised..are circumscribed by the following property.
3. Geom. To describe (a figure) about another figure so as to touch it at certain points or parts without cutting it.
b. With the figure so described as subject of the verb.
1570Billingsley Euclid iv. Introd. 110 How a triangle..may be circumscribed about a circle. 1571Digges Pantom. iv. xxiii. E e, Tetraedron may be conteyned or circumscribed of all the other foure regular bodies. 1660Barrow Euclid iv. Def. 4. 1827 Hutton Course Math. I. 285 A right-lined figure Circumscribes a circle, or the circle is Inscribed in it. 1840Lardner Geom. 87 The circle is..inscribed in the polygon, and the polygon is circumscribed around the circle. Ibid. 231 A regular tetraedron circumscribing the octaedron. 1885C. Leudesdorf Cremona's Proj. Geom. 141 So as to form a (simple) quadrilateral circumscribed to the conic.
†4. To write or inscribe around (a coin, etc., with an inscription, or an inscription on or about a coin, etc.). Obs.
1614Selden Titles Hon. 145 An old coin..circumscribed thus ϕΙλΕταΙρου βαϹΙλΕΩϹ. a1692Ashmole Antiq. Berks. I. 180 (T.) The Verge..is also lined with brass, and thereon is circumscribed this epitaph.
b. To join in signing a ‘round-robin’. See circumscriber. |