cline

See also: Cline and -cline

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /klaɪn/

  • Audio (Southern England)

    (file)

• Rhymes: -aɪn

Etymology 1

Ancient Greek κλῑ́νω (klī́nō, “to lean, incline”). Introduced by English evolutionary biologist and eugenicist Julian Huxley in 1938 after British mycologist John Ramsbottom suggested the term.

Noun

cline (plural clines)

1. (systematics) A gradation in a character or phenotype within a species or other group.
2. Any graduated continuum.
   • 2005, Ronnie Cann, Ruth Kempson, Lutz Marten, The Dynamics of Language, an Introduction, page 412:

     This account effectively reconstructs the well-known grammaticalisation cline from anaphora to agreement, …

Derived terms

• clinal

Related terms

• client
• climate
• climax
• clinic
• clivus
• lean

Translations

systematics

• Finnish: kliini

Etymology 2

From c(ircle) + line; compare circline.

Noun

cline (plural clines)

1. (geometry, inversive geometry) A generalized circle.
   • 2001, Michael Henle, Modern Geometries: Non-Euclidean, Projective, and Discrete‎^[1], page 77:

     Let C₁ and C₂ be two nonintersecting clines. Prove that there is a unique pair of points that are simultaneously symmetric to both C₁ and C₂.

   • 2009, Michael P. Hitchman, Geometry with an Introduction to Cosmic Topology‎^[2], page 64:

     To visualize Möbius transformations, it is helpful to focus on fixed points and, in the case of two fixed points, on two families of clines with respect to these points.

   • 2011, Dominique Michelucci, What is a Line?, Pascal Schreck, Julien Narboux, Jürgen Richter-Gebert (editors), Automated Deduction in Geometry, 8th International Workshop, ADG 2010, Revised Selected Papers, LNAI 6877, page 139,

     Let Ω be a fixed, arbitrary, point. Then circles (in the classical sense) through Ω can be considered as lines. For convenience, such circles are called clines in this section. Two distinct clines cut in one point (ignoring Ω and the two cyclic points); it can happen that Ω is a double intersection point; in this case, one may say that the two clines are parallel, and that they meet at a point at infinity, which is Ω.

Synonyms

• (generalized circle): circline, generalized circle

Further reading

• “cline”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.

Anagrams

• incel, incle