Wiktionary

spire

See also: 'spire

English

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Pronunciation

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Etymology 1

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From Middle English spire, spyre, spier, spir, from Old English spīr, from Proto-Germanic *spīrō, *spīrǭ (“peak; point; tip; stalk”). Cognate with Dutch spier, German Low German Spier, German Spier, Spiere, Danish spir, Norwegian spir and spire, Swedish spira, Icelandic spíra.

Noun

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spire (plural spires)

  1. (now rare) The stalk or stem of a plant. [from 10th c.]
  2. A young shoot of a plant; a spear. [from 14th c.]
  3. Any of various tall grasses, rushes, or sedges, such as the marram, the reed canary-grass, etc.
  4. A sharp or tapering point. [from 16th c.]
    • 1907 January, Harold Bindloss, chapter 1, in The Dust of Conflict, 1st Canadian edition, Toronto, Ont.: McLeod & Allen, →OCLC:
      A beech wood with silver firs in it rolled down the face of the hill, and the maze of leafless twigs and dusky spires cut sharp against the soft blueness of the evening sky.
  5. (architecture) A tapering structure built on a roof or tower, especially as one of the central architectural features of a church or cathedral roof. [from 16th c.]
    The spire of the church rose high above the town.
  6. The top, or uppermost point, of anything; the summit. [from 17th c.]
  7. (mining) A tube or fuse for communicating fire to the charge in blasting.
Derived terms
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Translations
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Verb

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spire (third-person singular simple present spires, present participle spiring, simple past and past participle spired)

  1. (of a seed, plant etc.) to sprout, to send forth the early shoots of growth; to germinate. [from 14th c.]
    • 1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book III, Canto V”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC:
      In gentle Ladies breste and bounteous race / Of woman kind it fayrest Flowre doth spyre, / And beareth fruit of honour and all chast desyre.
    • 1707, J[ohn] Mortimer, The Whole Art of Husbandry; or, The Way of Managing and Improving of Land. […], London: […] J[ohn] H[umphreys] for H[enry] Mortlock […], and J[onathan] Robinson […], →OCLC:
      It is not so apt to spire up as the other sorts, being more inclined to branch into arms.
  2. To grow upwards rather than develop horizontally. [from 14th c.]
  3. (transitive) To furnish with a spire.

Etymology 2

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From Old French spirer, and its source, Latin spīrō (“to breathe”).

Verb

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spire (third-person singular simple present spires, present participle spiring, simple past and past participle spired)

  1. (intransitive, obsolete) To breathe. [14th–16th c.]

Etymology 3

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From Middle French spire.

Noun

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spire (plural spires)

  1. One of the sinuous foldings of a serpent or other reptile; a coil. [from 16th c.]
  2. A spiral. [from 17th c.]
  3. (geometry) The part of a spiral generated in one revolution of the straight line about the pole.

Anagrams

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French

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Etymology

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From Latin spira, from Ancient Greek σπεῖρα (speîra).

Pronunciation

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Noun

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spire f (plural spires)

  1. turn (of a spiral)
  2. turn (of an electromagnetic coil)

Further reading

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Anagrams

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Italian

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Pronunciation

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  • IPA(key): /ˈspi.re/
  • Rhymes: -ire
  • Hyphenation: spì‧re

Noun

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spire f

  1. plural of spira

Anagrams

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Middle English

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Noun

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spire

  1. Alternative form of spere (“sphere”)

Norwegian Bokmål

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Etymology

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From Old Norse spíra (stem, pipe; little tree).

Noun

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spire f or m (definite singular spira or spiren, indefinite plural spirer, definite plural spirene)

  1. sprout

Verb

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spire (present tense spirer, past tense spirte, past participle spirt)

  1. to sprout

References

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Venetan

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Noun

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spire

  1. plural of spira
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Note 1