embrasure

English

embrasures in Flodden Tower, Edinburgh

Etymology

From Middle French embrasure.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ɪmˈbɹeɪʒə(ɹ)/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

Noun

embrasure (plural embrasures)

1. (architecture, military) Any of the indentations between the merlons of a battlement; an opening in a wall or parapet through which ordnance can be fired.
   • 1938 April, George Orwell [pseudonym; Eric Arthur Blair], chapter VI, in Homage to Catalonia, London: Secker & Warburg, →OCLC:

     But there were less casualties than might have been expected, and the barricade rose steadily, a wall of concrete two feet thick, with embrasures for two machine-guns and a small field gun.

2. (figurative) Any small protected space.
   • 1938, Norman Lindsay, Age of Consent, 1st Australian edition, Sydney, N.S.W.: Ure Smith, published 1962, →OCLC, page 128:

     She had a special seat there, a little embrasure between two upright slabs of sandstone, which was sheltered and private.

3. The slanting indentation in a wall for a door or window, such that the space is larger on the inside than the outside.
   • 1916, James Joyce, chapter 3, in A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man‎^[1]:

     When the fit had spent itself he walked weakly to the window and, lifting the sash, sat in a corner of the embrasure and leaned his elbow upon the sill.

   • 2009, Hilary Mantel, Wolf Hall, Fourth Estate, published 2010, page 155:

     Now he stands in a window embrasure, Liz's prayer book in hand.

4. (obsolete) An embrace.
   • c. 1602, William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Troylus and Cressida”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act IV, scene iv]:

     And suddenly; where injury of chance / Puts back leave-taking, justles roughly by / All time of pause, rudely beguiles our lips / Of all rejoindure, forcibly prevents / Our lock'd embrasures, strangles our dear vows / Even in the birth of our own labouring breath:

Derived terms

• embrasured

 

Translations

any of the indentations between the merlons of a battlement

• Arabic: مَزْغَل m (mazḡal)
• Azerbaijani: mazğal
• Bulgarian: бо́йница (bg) f (bójnica), амбразу́ра (bg) f (ambrazúra), мазга́л (bg) m (mazgál)
• Catalan: tronera (ca) f
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 垛口 (zh) (duǒkǒu)

• Danish: please add this translation if you can
• Dutch: schietgat (nl) n
• Finnish: ampuma-aukko (fi)
• French: embrasure (fr) f, ébrasure (fr) f
• Galician: troneira f
• German: Scharte (de) f, Schießscharte (de) f
• Greek: πολεμίστρα (el) f (polemístra), μασγάλι n (masgáli), σμαγδάλι n (smagdáli)
• Gujarati: please add this translation if you can
• Hindi: please add this translation if you can
• Kazakh: please add this translation if you can
• Macedonian: пушкарница f (puškarnica), стрелачница f (strelačnica)
• Norman: êvilement m
• Persian: please add this translation if you can
• Polish: ambrazura (pl) f
• Portuguese: troneira (pt) f
• Russian: амбразу́ра (ru) (ambrazúra), бойни́ца (ru) (bojníca)
• Serbo-Croatian: pùškārnica (sh) f, màzgāl (sh) m
• Spanish: tronera (es) f
• Swedish: embrasyr c
• Telugu: please add this translation if you can
• Turkish: mazgal (tr)
• Ukrainian: амбразу́ра (uk) f (ambrazúra)
• Welsh: agorfa f, saethdwll m

Further reading

• embrasure on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

French

Etymology

From embraser +‎ -ure.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ɑ̃.bʁa.zyʁ/

Noun

embrasure f (plural embrasures)

1. (architecture) embrasure

Descendants

• → Polish: ambrazura
• → Russian: амбразура (ambrazura)
  • → Georgian: ამბრაზურა (ambrazura)

Further reading

• “embrasure”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.