elliptical
Pronunciation
  • (British) IPA: /ɪˈlɪp.tɪk.əl/
  • (America) IPA: /ɪˈlɪp.tɪ.kəl/, /əˈlɪp.tɪ.kəl/
Adjective

elliptical

  1. In a shape of, or reminding of, an ellipse; oval.
    • 1876, Edward Roth (translator), All Around the Moon, Chapter XIX,
      Having admitted that the projectile was describing an orbit around the moon, this orbit must necessarily be elliptical; science proves that it must be so.
  2. Of, or showing ellipsis; having a word or words omitted.
    If he is sometimes elliptical and obscure, it is because he has so much to tell us. -- Edmund Wilson
  3. (of speech) Concise, condensed.
    • 1903, Gilbert Keith Chesterton, Robert Browning, Chapter VI,
      Browning's dark and elliptical mode of speech, like his love of the grotesque, was simply a characteristic of his, a trick of his temperament, and had little or nothing to do with whether what he was expressing was profound or superficial.
    • early XX c., The Making of a New Yorker, by O. Henry
      He was called a tramp; but that was only an elliptical way of saying that he was a philosopher, an artist, a traveller, a naturalist and a discoverer.
  4. (mathematics, rare) Elliptic.
Synonyms Translations Translations
  • French: elliptique
  • Russian: эллипти́ческий
Translations
  • Russian: кра́ткий
Noun

elliptical (plural ellipticals)

  1. (astronomy) An elliptical galaxy
  2. An elliptical trainer



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