echinus

American  

[ih-kahy-nuhs] / ɪˈkaɪ nəs /

noun

• echini
  plural

1. any sea urchin of the genus Echinus.

2. Architecture.

   1. an ovolo molding, especially one having an outline with several radii or one carved with an egg-and-dart pattern.

   2. the prominent circular molding supporting the abacus of a Doric or Tuscan capital.

   3. Also called cymatium.  the circular molding, usually carved with an egg-and-dart pattern, forming part of an Ionic capital between the volutes and under the balteus.

---

echinus British  

/ ɪˈkaɪnəs /

noun

1. architect an ovolo moulding between the shaft and the abacus of a Doric column

2. any of the sea urchins of the genus Echinus, such as E. esculentus ( edible sea urchin ) of the Mediterranean

---

Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• echini
  plural

Etymology

Origin of echinus

1325–75; Middle English < Latin < Greek echînos hedgehog, sea urchin

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

echinus echini

Yet the echinus can have, at the best, none but the most distant genetic relationship with the Polyzoa.

From On the Genesis of Species by St. George Mivart

If I was to bend round the rays of the starfish and fill up the interior, I could produce an animal very like the echinus.

From Ernest Bracebridge School Days by William I. Thomas

This, though a less rational and expressive form for its particular office than is the echinus of the Doric cap, is a far more perfect symbol of the feminine element in nature.

From The Beautiful Necessity Seven Essays on Theosophy and Architecture by Claude Fayette Bragdon

Some have only the Latin plural, which usually changes us to i; as, alumnus, alumni; androgynus, androgyni; calculus, calculi; dracunculus, dracunculi; echinus, echini; magus, magi.

From The Grammar of English Grammars by Goold Brown

The upward force is manifest primarily in the vertical columns, and is emphasized there by the flutings, the slight progressive narrowing toward the top, and the inward effort of the necking just below the echinus.

From The Principles of Aesthetics by Dewitt H. Parker

In the same stone the claws of crabs, fragments of echini, and other signs of a neighbouring beach, are observed.

From The Student's Elements of Geology by Sir Charles Lyell

I don't think you come behind him of whose exquisite Skill the Satyrist says, Ostrea callebat primo deprendere morsu, Et semel aspecti dicebat littus echini.

From Colloquies of Erasmus, Volume I. by Desiderius Erasmus

His chief work was the description of the invertebrate fossils of New York—in which he dealt with the graptolites, brachiopods, mollusca, trilobites, echini and crinoids of the Palaeozoic formations.

From Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 12, Slice 7 "Gyantse" to "Hallel" by Various

Its proper diet consists of the smaller marine animals, such as crabs, echini, and molluscs, alive or dead, fish and carrion.

From British Birds in their Haunts by Rev. C. A. Johns

Of the echinodermes, remarkable for their coating of spines, asteri, sea-stars, pantacrinae, comatules, asterophons, echini, holothuri, etc., represented individually a complete collection of this group.

From Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea by Jules Verne