Catherine wheel


noun
  1. a firework that revolves on a pin, making a wheel of fire or sparks; pinwheel.

Origin of Catherine wheel

1
1175–1225; Middle English; named after St. Catherine of Alexandria, from wheel used to torture her

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024

How to use Catherine wheel in a sentence

  • After which he went away as a catherine-wheel, and I saw him no more.

    A Great Emergency and Other Tales | Juliana Horatia Gatty Ewing
  • This sends the hair all out like a Catherine-wheel, and dries the brush with quite astonishing rapidity.

    Stained Glass Work | C. W. Whall
  • The most beautiful of these is the Snow-white, looking, with its radii of different lengths, like a lighted catherine-wheel.

    Mirror of the Months | Peter George Patmore
  • It seemed to Plunger, so far as he had any sensation at all, that he was performing the part of a human catherine-wheel.

    The Hero of Garside School | J. Harwood Panting
  • The Catherine wheel (Fig. 556), however, is the most usual heraldic form.

    A Complete Guide to Heraldry | Arthur Charles Fox-Davies

British Dictionary definitions for Catherine wheel

Catherine wheel

noun
  1. Also called: pinwheel a type of firework consisting of a powder-filled spiral tube, mounted with a pin through its centre. When lit it rotates quickly, producing a display of sparks and coloured flame

  2. a circular window having ribs radiating from the centre

Origin of Catherine wheel

1
C16: named after St Catherine of Alexandria

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012