kiln
Americannoun
verb (used with object)
noun
verb
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of kiln
before 900; Middle English kiln ( e ), Old English cylen < Latin culīna kitchen
Explanation
A kiln is a special kind of oven for firing things like pottery and bricks. A ceramic artist might use a kiln once a week to fire the bowls he's made from clay. Some kilns look more like furnaces than ovens, and they reach temperatures far beyond regular household ovens. Electricity is used to power many modern kilns, while others use older techniques of burning wood or even coal. Making mugs and bowls is the primary use of kilns, but there are some that dry lumber, tobacco leaves, or hops as well. The Old English word was cyln, from the Latin root culina, "kitchen or cooking stove."
Vocabulary lists containing kiln
A Single Shard
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Visual Arts - Introductory
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Visual Arts - High School
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
At a cavernous facility in Morbi, in India's western Gujarat state, a 200-metre-long propane-powered kiln that normally fires clay nonstop is silent.
From Barron's • Mar. 29, 2026
Ongoing electrical outages that keep the kiln from operating, among other issues, makes the work challenging, said Svitlana Silina, a 73-year-old retired forestry engineer.
From The Wall Street Journal • Dec. 29, 2025
The house is wrapped in clinker brick, a term for when clay bricks are set too close to the flames when being fired in a kiln, giving them distorted shapes and colors.
From Los Angeles Times • Nov. 21, 2025
After this, the wood goes into a large kiln where it is dried in a process that can last anywhere from 10 days to six weeks.
From BBC • Nov. 6, 2025
I spotted Manet off in the corner, loading tile into a kiln.
From "The Name of the Wind" by Patrick Rothfuss
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
