Contextualizebeta

millstone

noun
/ˈmɪlstəʊn/UK/ˈmɪlˌstoʊn/US

Etymology

From Middle English mylneston, milneston, from Old English mylenstān (“millstone”), from Proto-West Germanic *mulīnu + *stain; equivalent to mill + stone; cognate with Danish møllesten, Middle Dutch molensteen (modern Dutch molensteen), West Frisian molestien, Norwegian Bokmål møllestein, Old Saxon mulinstēn (Middle Low German mȫlenstēn), Old High German mulinstein, mülstein (Middle High German mülstein, modern German Mühlstein).

  1. inherited from mylenstān — “millstone”
  2. inherited from mylneston

Definitions

  1. A large round stone used for grinding grain.

    • We can tell what Australopithecines ate from the remains of their jaws and teeth. The earliest finds show teeth which are large and round like millstones – acting as grinding and pulverizing machines for fibrous vegetation.

  2. A coarse-grained sandstone used for making such stones

    A coarse-grained sandstone used for making such stones; millstone grit.

  3. Ellipsis of millstone around one's neck, a heavy responsibility that is difficult to bear…

    Ellipsis of millstone around one's neck, a heavy responsibility that is difficult to bear (referring to Matthew 18:6 in the Bible).

    • Paying the mortgage every month is a millstone round their necks.
    • [H]owever great and powerful England may be, the strain of such entanglements cannot but tell on her, and one day she may find herself in a predicament in which India may simply hang as a mill-stone round her neck.
  4. ›+ 5 more definitions

    1. A nuclear power station near Waterford, Connecticut, USA.

    2. An unincorporated community in Mercer County, New Jersey, United States.

    3. A township in Monmouth County, New Jersey.

    4. A borough in Somerset County, New Jersey.

    5. A tributary of the Raritan River in New Jersey

      A tributary of the Raritan River in New Jersey; in full, the Millstone River.

The neighborhood

Derived

burr millstone, hard as the nether millstone, lava millstone, into a millstone, through a millstone

Vish — recursive loop

A definitional loop anchored at millstone. Each word in the ring is defined by the next; follow the chain far enough and it folds back on itself. Scroll to it and watch.

01millstone02stones03band04surrounding05environment06item07picked08pick09millstones

A definitional loop anchored at millstone. Each word in the ring appears in the definition of the next; follow the chain far enough and it folds back on itself.

9 hops · closes at millstone

curated · pre-corpus. live cycle detection across the full graph is the next major milestone.

sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA