heliograph
English
Etymology
Noun
heliograph (plural heliographs)
- An apparatus for signalling by means of a moveable mirror which reflects flashes of sunlight.
- 1919, Rudyard Kipling, “A Code of Morals”, in Departmental Ditties and Ballads and Barrack-Room Ballads:
- And Love had made him very sage, as Nature made her fair; / So Cupid and Apollo linked, per heliograph, the pair.
- 1979, Alasdair Gray, ‘Five Letters From an Eastern Empire’, Canongate 2012 (Every Short Story 1951-2012), p. 93:
- when we stood up at nightfall we saw, in the sunset, the sparkle of the heliograph above cities, on the far side of the horizon.
- A heliogram.
- An instrument for measuring the intensity of sunlight.
- A device for photographing the sun.
- (obsolete) A photograph.
Derived terms
Verb
heliograph (third-person singular simple present heliographs, present participle heliographing, simple past and past participle heliographed)
- (transitive) To send a message by heliograph.
- 1919, Rudyard Kipling, “A Code of Morals”, in Departmental Ditties and Ballads and Barrack-Room Ballads:
- With damnatory dot and dash he heliographed his wife / Some interesting details of the General's private life.
- (intransitive) To send a heliograph.
- (transitive, dated) To photograph by sunlight.
Further reading
- heliograph on Wikipedia.Wikipedia