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meteor

 - 6 dictionary results

me⋅te⋅or

  [mee-tee-er, -awr]
Use meteor in a Sentence
–noun
1. Astronomy.
a. a meteoroid that has entered the earth's atmosphere.
b. a transient fiery streak in the sky produced by a meteoroid passing through the earth's atmosphere; a shooting star or bolide.
2. any person or object that moves, progresses, becomes famous, etc., with spectacular speed.
3. (formerly) any atmospheric phenomenon, as hail or a typhoon.
4. (initial capital letter) Military. Britain's first operational jet fighter, a twin-engine aircraft that entered service in 1944.
Origin:
1570–80; < NL meteōrum < Gk metéōron meteor, a thing in the air, n. use of neut. of metéōros raised in the air, equiv. to met- met- + eōr- (var. s. of aéirein to raise) + -os adj. suffix

Related forms:
me⋅te⋅or⋅like, adjective

meteor.

 
1. meteorological.
2. meteorology.
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2009.
Cite This Source Link To meteor
me·te·or   (mē'tē-ər, -ôr')   
n.  A bright trail or streak that appears in the sky when a meteoroid is heated to incandescence by friction with the earth's atmosphere. Also called falling star, meteor burst, shooting star.

[Middle English metheour, atmospheric phenomenon, from Old French meteore, from Medieval Latin meteōrum, from Greek meteōron, astronomical phenomenon, from neuter of meteōros, high in the air : meta-, meta- + -āoros, lifted; akin to āeirein, to lift up; see wer-1 in Indo-European roots.]
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2009 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
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Cultural Dictionary

meteor

A streak of light in the sky, often called a “shooting star,” that occurs when a bit of extraterrestrial matter falls into the atmosphere of the Earth and burns up.

Note: Meteor showers occur at regular times during the year.
The American Heritage® New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition
Copyright © 2005 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
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Word Origin & History

meteor 
1471, "any atmospheric phenomenon," from M.Fr. meteore (13c.), from M.L. meteorum (nom. meteora), from Gk. ta meteora "the celestial phenomena," pl. of meteoron, lit. "thing high up," neut. of meteoros (adj.) "high up," from meta- "over, beyond" (see meta-) + -aoros "lifted, hovering in air," related to aeirein "to raise" (see aorta). Specific sense of "fireball, shooting star" is attested from 1593. Atmospheric phenomena were formerly classified as aerial meteors (wind), aqueous meteors (rain, snow, hail), luminous meteors (aurora, rainbows), and igneous meteors (lightning, shooting stars). Meteoric in the figurative sense of "transiently brilliant" is from 1836.
Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2001 Douglas Harper
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Computing Dictionary

METEOR
A version of COMIT with Lisp-like syntax, written in MIT Lisp 1.5 for the IBM 7090. "METEOR - A List Interpreter for String Transformation", D.G. Bobrow in The Programming Language LISP and its Interpretation, E.D. and D.G. Bobrow eds, 1964.

The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing, © 1993-2007 Denis Howe
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