sconce

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /skɒns/

• Audio (US):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɒns

Etymology 1

A modern style of sconce.

An older style of sconce.

(deprecated template usage)

From Middle English sconce, skonce, sconse, from Old French esconce (“lantern”), from Latin absconsus (“hidden”), perfect passive participle of abscondō (“hide”). Cognate with abscond.

Noun

sconce (plural sconces)

1. A light fixture.
   • (Can we date this quote?), Evelyn, (Please provide the book title or journal name):

     […] tapers put into lanterns or sconces of several-coloured, oiled paper, that the wind might not annoy them.

   • 1847, John Dryden, The Works of John Dryden in Verse and Prose, volume 1, Harper, The Beginning of the Second Book of Lucretius, page 183, line 28:

     Golden sconces hang not on the walls.

2. A head or a skull.
   • c. 1599-1602, William Shakespeare, Hamlet, Act V, scene 1:

     Why does he suffer this rude knave now, to knock him about the sconce with a dirty shovel, and will not tell him of his action of battery?

   • 1818, John Keats, On Some Skulls in Beauly Abbey, near Inverness:

     Long time this sconce a helmet wore,
     But sickness smites the conscience sore;
     He broke his sword, and hither bore
     His gear and plunder,
     Took to the cowl,—then rav’d and swore
     At his damn’d blunder!

3. A poll tax; a mulct or fine.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Johnson to this entry?)

4. A piece of armor for the head; headpiece; helmet.
   • (Can we date this quote?), William Shakespeare, (Please provide the book title or journal name):

     I must get a sconce for my head.

Related terms

• abscond

Translations

light fixture on a wall

• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 灯台 (zh) (dēngtái), 烛台 (zh) (zhútái)

• Dutch: kandelaar (nl) m, schemerlamp (nl) m or f
• French: applique murale f, applique (fr) f
• German: Wandlampe f, Wandleuchte f, Wandleuchter m
• Hungarian: fali lámpa
• Italian: candelabro (it) m, candeliere da parete m
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}
• Polish: kinkiet (pl) m
• Russian: бра (ru) n (bra)
• Spanish: aplique (es) m
• Swedish: applick c
• Welsh: goleuddal m

Verb

1. (obsolete) to impose a fine, a forfeit, or a mulct.

   (The addition of quotations indicative of this usage is being sought:)

Etymology 2

Borrowed from Middle Dutch schans, cognate with German Schanze.

Alternative forms

• skonce

Noun

sconce (plural sconces)

1. A type of small fort or other fortification, especially as built to defend a pass or ford.
   • Milton

     No sconce or fortress of his raising was ever known either to have been forced, or yielded up, or quitted.

2. (obsolete) A hut for protection and shelter; a stall.
   • Beaumont and Fletcher

     one that […] must raise a sconce by the highway and sell switches

3. The circular tube, with a brim, in a candlestick, into which the candle is inserted.
4. (architecture) A squinch.
5. A fragment of a floe of ice.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Kane to this entry?)

6. A fixed seat or shelf.

Derived terms

• ensconce

Verb

1. (obsolete) to shut within a sconce; to imprison.

Further reading

• “sconce”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• “sconce”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.
• Douglas Harper (2001–2024) “sconce”, in Online Etymology Dictionary.