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ALTAR
| Pronunciation (US): |  | (GB): | |
I. (noun)
Sense 1
Meaning:
A raised structure on which gifts or sacrifices to a god are made
Classified under:
Nouns denoting man-made objects
Hypernyms ("altar" 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 "altar"):
high altar (the main altar in a church)
Sense 2
Meaning:
The table in Christian churches where communion is given
Synonyms:
altar; communion table; Lord's table
Classified under:
Nouns denoting man-made objects
Hypernyms ("altar" is a kind of...):
table (a piece of furniture having a smooth flat top that is usually supported by one or more vertical legs)
Context examples:
I sold my spoil, mes garcons, for as many gold-pieces as I could hold in my hufken, and for seven days I lit twelve wax candles upon the altar of St. Andrew; for if you forget the blessed when things are well with you, they are very likely to forget you when you have need of them.
(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
To man has been given the grief, often, of seeing his gods overthrown and his altars crumbling; but to the wolf and the wild dog that have come in to crouch at man's feet, this grief has never come.
(White Fang, by Jack London)
Mr. Dick, who is to give my darling to me at the altar, has had his hair curled.
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
I went to the altar with him with the intention to make him just as good a wife as it was in me to be.
(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
In answer to my inquiries after the use of this article, she informed me it was a covering for the altar of a new church lately erected near Gateshead.
(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)
This is a way of life which reminds me of the period when I was myself in a state of celibacy, and Mrs. Micawber had not yet been solicited to plight her faith at the Hymeneal altar.
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
But you may imagine what I felt when, just as I came to the altar rails, I glanced back and saw Frank standing and looking at me out of the first pew.
(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
We entered the quiet and humble temple; the priest waited in his white surplice at the lowly altar, the clerk beside him.
(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)
In bidding adieu to the modern Babylon, where we have undergone many vicissitudes, I trust not ignobly, Mrs. Micawber and myself cannot disguise from our minds that we part, it may be for years and it may be for ever, with an individual linked by strong associations to the altar of our domestic life.
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
I only wonder I didn’t fall down and do a faint right there before the altar.
(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
