tower

Noun

1. A tall, narrow structure (significantly taller than it is wide, either standing alone or forming part of a larger structure.
   • an observation tower, an isolated watch tower, a church tower, conning tower
   • The valley is closed in at the lower end by the village, the church tower and a few roofs being visible through the trees; […] - 1878, Harold Lewis, The Church Rambler: A Series of Articles on the Churches..., page 440:
   • […] an isolated watch-tower still stands above the highway as it passes around the lowest ridge extending from the castle. Called Burj al-Sabi ('Tower of the Youth'), it protected the access to the castle's port […] -...

   1. A very tall open-framed structure on which communications devices are installed.

      • signal tower, radio tower, cell tower

   2. A similarly framed structure with a platform or enclosed area on top.

      • observation tower, watch tower

   3. A control tower.

   4. A skyscraper.

      • The Sears Tower
      • He'd taken her to see […] The Towering Inferno […] She imagined the screen itself must be hot as the burning San Francisco tower. […] She expected the screen to go up in a sheath of flame as the Glass Tower had,...
2. An item of various kinds, such as a computer case, that is higher than it is wide.
3. A strong refuge; a defence.
   • Thou hast been a shelter for me, and a strong tower from the enemy. - 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Psalms 61:3:
   • A group of giraffes is called a tower. - 2019 June 6, “A gaggle, a confusion and a conspiracy - bizarre animal collective group names”, in BBC:
4. Each of a set of information technology concerns within a business, which are treated separately so that they can be handled by different providers.
   • Suppliers compete separately for the towers and service integrator and management contract, which assists the government in the integration and operation of its services. - 2013, Great Britain, The Impact of...
   • Service towers are significant IT functional areas, such as infrastructure, applications, security, etc., each possibly managed by a different service provider. The service integrator role is crucial for coordinating...
5. The sixteenth named (trump or Major Arcana) card in many Tarot decks, usually deemed an ill omen.
6. The nineteenth Lenormand card, representing structure, bureaucracy, stability and loneliness.
7. A group of giraffes.
8. A metal stand used as a pivot to support a punty at a furnace.
9. A tall fashionable headdress worn in the time of King William III and Queen Anne.
   • Lay trains of amorous intrigues / In towers, and curls, and periwigs. - 1662 (indicated as 1663), [Samuel Butler], “[The First Part of Hudibras]”, in Hudibras. The First and Second Parts. […], London: […] John Martyn...
10. High flight; elevation.
    • Nigh in her sight The Bird of Jove, stoopt from his aerie tour, Two Birds of gayest plume before him drove. - 1667, John Milton, “Book XI”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by...

Noun Entry 2

1. One who tows.
   • But as the tower and towee reached the cross-roads again, another car, negligently driven, came round the corner, hit the Morris, and severed the tow rope, sending the unfortunate car back again into the shop window[…]...

Verb

1. To be very tall.
   • The office block towered into the sky.
   • Potentilla and Ivory Daphne sat humpily about on the unfolded lawns, and ahead, there towered out enormous cliffs and fantastic pinnacles of what looked like Dolomite. - 1921, Reginald Farrer, chapter 10, in The Rainbow...
   • This is itself a cheerless spot, particularly on a rainy day, when, overshadowed by the great massif of rock that towers in the background, and surrounded by the grey and cheerless quarries, it has a depressing...
2. To be high or lofty; to soar.
   • My lord protector's hawks do tower so well. - 1591 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Second Part of Henry the Sixt, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies. […] (First Folio), London:...
   • When Hope, the eagle that tower’d, could see No cliff beyond him in the sky, His pinions were bent droopingly — And homeward turn’d his soften’d eye. - 1829, Edgar Allan Poe, “Tamerlane”, in Al Aaraaf, Tamerlane and...
   • As we breasted the first summit, the precipitous mass of the Raven's Rock, towering some 250 ft. above the railway, looked grim and forbidding in the failing light, and distant Ben Wyves was shrouded in mist. - 1951...
3. To soar into.
   • Her state with oary feet; yet oft they quit The dank, and, rising on stiff pennons, tower The mid aerial sky - 1667, John Milton, “(please specify the page number)”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons],...

Wikipedia

tower