compass

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English [edit]

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Compasses for drawing and cutting

Etymology [edit]

For noun: from Middle English compas (“a circle, circuit, limit, form, a mathematical instrument”), from Old French compas, from Medieval Latin compassus (“a circle, a circuit”), from Latin com- (“together”) + passus (“a pace, step, later a pass, way, route”); see pass, pace.

For verb: from Middle English compassen (“to go around, make a circuit, draw a circle, contrive, intend”), from Old French compasser; from the noun; see compass as a noun.

Pronunciation [edit]

Noun [edit]

compass (plural compasses)

  1. A magnetic or electronic device used to determine the cardinal directions (usually magnetic or true north).
  2. A pair of compasses (a device used to draw an arc or circle).
  3. (music) The range of notes of a musical instrument or voice.
  4. (obsolete) A space within limits; area.
    • 1763, M. Le Page Du Pratz, History of Louisiana (PG), page 47:
      In going up the Missisippi [sic], we meet with nothing remarkable before we come to the Detour aux Anglois, the English Reach: in that part the river takes a large compass.
  5. Scope.
    • 1748, David Hume, Enquiries concerning the human understanding and concerning the principles of moral, Oxford University Press (1973), section 8:
      There is a truth and falsehood in all propositions on this subject, and a truth and falsehood, which lie not beyond the compass of human understanding.
    • 1844, Edgar Allan Poe, Marginalia
      How very commonly we hear it remarked that such and such thoughts are beyond the compass of words! I do not believe that any thought, properly so called, is out of the reach of language.

Derived terms [edit]

Terms derived from compass

Translations [edit]

navigational compass
pair of compasses — see pair of compasses
range of notes of a musical instrument or voice
area
scope
The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables, removing any numbers. Numbers do not necessarily match those in definitions. See instructions at Help:How to check translations.
Translations to be checked

Verb [edit]

compass (third-person singular simple present compasses, present participle compassing, simple past and past participle compassed)

  1. To surround; to encircle; to environ; to stretch round.
  2. To go about or round entirely; to traverse.
  3. (dated) To accomplish; to reach; to achieve; to obtain.
    • 1763, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Emilius; or, an essay on education, translated by M. Nugent, page 117:
      [...] they never find ways sufficient to compass that end.
    • 1816, Catholicon: or, the Christian Philosopher, volume 3, from July to December 1816, page 56:
      [...] to settle the end of our action or disputation; and then to take fit and effectual means to compass that end.
    • 1857, Gilbert Burnet, Bishop Burnet's History of His Own Time: from the Restoration of King Charles the Second to the Treaty of Peace at Utrecht in the Reign of Queen Anne, page 657:
      [...] and was an artful flatterer, when that was necessary to compass his end, in which generally he was successful.
    • 1921 November 23, The New Republic, volume 28, number 364, page 2:
      The immediate problem is how to compass that end: by the seizure of territory or by the cultivation of the goodwill of the people whose business she seeks.
  4. (dated) To plot; to scheme (against someone).
    • 1600, The Arraignment and Judgement of Captain Thomas Lee, published in 1809, by R. Bagshaw, in Cobbett's Complete Collection of State Trials, volume 1, page 1403–04:
      That he plotted and compassed to raise Sedition and Rebellion [...]
    • 1794 November 1, Speech of Mr. Erskine in Behalf of Hardy, published in 1884, by Chauncey Allen Goodrich, in Select British Eloquence, page 719:
      But it went beyond it by the loose construction of compassing to depose the King, [...]
    • 1915, The Wireless Age, volume 2, page 580:
      The Bavarian felt a mad wave of desire for her sweep over him. What scheme wouldn't he compass to mould that girl to his wishes.

Quotations [edit]

Synonyms [edit]

Translations [edit]

surround
go about or round entirely
accomplish
plot

Adverb [edit]

compass (comparative more compass, superlative most compass)

  1. (obsolete) In a circuit; round about.
    • 1658, Thomas Browne, Urne-Burial,[1] Penguin (2005), ISBN 9780141023915, page 9:
      Near the same plot of ground, for about six yards compasse were digged up coals and incinerated substances, […]

References [edit]

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