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LABYRINTH
| Pronunciation (US): |  | (GB): | |
I. (noun)
Sense 1
Meaning:
Complex system of paths or tunnels in which it is easy to get lost
Synonyms:
labyrinth; maze
Classified under:
Nouns denoting man-made objects
Hypernyms ("labyrinth" is a kind of...):
system (instrumentality that combines interrelated interacting artifacts designed to work as a coherent entity)
Instance hyponyms:
Labyrinth of Minos (a vast labyrinth built in Crete by Daedalus at the command of Minos in order to contain the Minotaur)
Derivation:
labyrinthian (resembling a labyrinth in form or complexity)
Sense 2
Meaning:
A complex system of interconnecting cavities; concerned with hearing and equilibrium
Synonyms:
inner ear; internal ear; labyrinth
Classified under:
Hypernyms ("labyrinth" is a kind of...):
receptor; sense organ; sensory receptor (an organ having nerve endings (in the skin or viscera or eye or ear or nose or mouth) that respond to stimulation)
Meronyms (parts of "labyrinth"):
neuroepithelium (epithelium associated with special sense organs and containing sensory nerve endings)
membranous labyrinth (the sensory structures of the inner ear including the labyrinthine receptors and the cochlea; contained within the bony labyrinth)
bony labyrinth; osseous labyrinth (cavity in the petrous part of the temporal bone that contains the membranous labyrinth)
endolymph (the bodily fluid that fills the membranous labyrinth of the inner ear)
perilymph (the bodily fluid that fills the space between the bony labyrinth and the membranous labyrinth of the inner ear)
semicircular canal (one of three tube loops filled with fluid and in planes nearly at right angles with one another; concerned with equilibrium)
cochlea (the snail-shaped tube (in the inner ear coiled around the modiolus) where sound vibrations are converted into nerve impulses by the organ of Corti)
artery of the labyrinth; internal auditory artery; labyrinthine artery (an artery that is a branch of the basilar artery that supplies the labyrinth)
internal auditory vein; labyrinthine vein (veins that drain the inner ear)
Holonyms ("labyrinth" is a part of...):
auditory apparatus (all of the components of the organ of hearing including the outer and middle and inner ears)
Context examples:
Afterwards, when we were fairly at our work, I found Mr. Jack Maldon's efforts more troublesome to me than I had expected, as he had not confined himself to making numerous mistakes, but had sketched so many soldiers, and ladies' heads, over the Doctor's manuscript, that I often became involved in labyrinths of obscurity.
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
The researchers took CT scans of the entire lung labyrinth and used two supercomputers — including one of the fastest systems in the world, Blue Waters — to simulate airflow patterns at the highest resolution.
(Following the lizard lung labyrinth, National Science Foundation)
The organ of hearing: composed of the external ear, which includes the auricle and the external acoustic, or auditory, meatus; the middle ear, or the tympanic cavity with its ossicles; and the internal ear or inner ear, or labyrinth, which includes the semicircular canals, vestibule, and cochlea.
(Murine Ear, NCI Thesaurus)
Jo accepted it with a smile, for she had never outgrown her liking for lads, and soon found herself involved in the usual labyrinth of love, mystery, and murder, for the story belonged to that class of light literature in which the passions have a holiday, and when the author's invention fails, a grand catastrophe clears the stage of one half the dramatis personae, leaving the other half to exult over their downfall.
(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)
We rattled through an endless labyrinth of gas-lit streets until we emerged into Farrington Street.
(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
Peterson had rushed forward to protect the stranger from his assailants; but the man, shocked at having broken the window, and seeing an official-looking person in uniform rushing towards him, dropped his goose, took to his heels, and vanished amid the labyrinth of small streets which lie at the back of Tottenham Court Road.
(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
It was a rich cream color, bright with nickel, swollen here and there in its monstrous length with triumphant hatboxes and supper-boxes and tool-boxes, and terraced with a labyrinth of windshields that mirrored a dozen suns.
(The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald)
