basin

Etymology

Definitions

1. 1

   A wide bowl for washing, sometimes affixed to a wall.

   • First, as you know, my house within the city Is richly furnished with plate and gold, Basins and ewers to lave her dainty hands;
   • After that he poureth water into a bason, and began to wash the disciples’ feet, and to wipe them with the towel wherewith he was girded.
2. 2

   A shallow bowl used for a single serving of a drink or liquidy food.

   • They have a good basin of coffee or cocoa for breakfast […]
   • He rose from the table; and advancing to the master, basin and spoon in hand, said: somewhat alarmed at his own temerity: ¶ ‘Please, sir, I want some more.’
3. 3

   A depression, natural or artificial, containing water.

   • This shortly brought them to a bewitching spring, whose basin was incrusted with a frostwork of glittering crystals […]
   • The fountains were plashing musically into marble and alabaster basins.
   • There was a stone basin of clear but motionless water, and the heavy reddish-and-yellow arches went round the courtyard with warrior-like fatality, their bases in dark shadow.
4. ›+ 7 more definitionsshow fewer

   1. 4

      An area of land from which water drains into a common outlet

      An area of land from which water drains into a common outlet; drainage basin.

   2. 5

      A shallow depression in a rock formation, such as an area of down-folded rock that has…

      A shallow depression in a rock formation, such as an area of down-folded rock that has accumulated a thick layer of sediments, or an area scooped out by water erosion.

   3. 6

      To create a concavity or depression in.

      • Then axial subsidence basined the surface of the dome.
      • Of course, this is exactly what did happen—the antiquated practice of basining the dies was cast aside for the Lincoln Cent.
   4. 7

      To serve as or become a basin.

      • The eastward pinching and thinning were caused by the rapid basining of the plateau over the Pasco-Richland area in south-central Washington.
      • Walls basined at a ca. 45° angle on the southwest side, but on the west and north there was little basining, with the floor sloping gently up to the original ground surface.
   5. 8

      To shelter or enclose in a basin.

      • A row of trees was basined in the latter part of April, and by the latter part of July, a little over three months, there was a remarkable improvement in the appearance of the basined row compared with the check trees.
      • Caesar's subjects bathed in Caesar's blood basinned in the purple pool of Calpurnia's dream; my sister slept in an ogre's thought and woke up on the hook of a cannibal finger.
   6. 9

      A census-designated place in Jefferson County, Montana.

   7. 10

      A town, the county seat of Big Horn County, Wyoming.

The neighborhood

• neighborBasin in the Encyclopædia Britannica (11th edition, 1911)