camelback

English

Etymology

From camel +‎ back.

A camelback house in New Orleans

A camelback locomotive

A curved camelback sofa

Noun

camelback (countable and uncountable, plural camelbacks)

1. (uncountable) The backs of camels.

   We travelled across the desert on camelback.

2. (countable) A flexible water container worn on the back.

   An empty camelback is a blessing and a curse: it is easy to carry, but it means you have no water.

3. (countable) A house with a second storey that does not completely cover the ground floor.

   My friend lived in a camelback; we used to have fun climbing out of the window onto the roof below.

4. (countable, rail transport) A railway locomotive that has its cab in the middle as opposed to at the end.

   The camelbacks were designed to help with the visibility problems inherent in putting the driver behind the entire engine.

5. (countable) A sofa or chair whose back has a raised middle part.

   He fell back relieved into his favourite camelback with a gin and tonic.

6. (uncountable) A type of rubber used in tyre restoration.

   We require four million tons of camelback each year.

   The camelback rubber produced in this plant is shipped around the world.

Further reading

camelback on Wikipedia.Wikipedia