SCONCE

A fortification, or work for defense; a fort. No sconce or fortress of his raising was ever known either to have been forced, or yielded up, or quitted. Milton.

A hut for protection and shelter; a stall. One that . . . must raise a sconce by the highway and sell switches. Beau. & Fl.

A piece of armor for the head; headpiece; helmet. I must get a sconce for my head. Shak.

Fig.: The head; the skull; also, brains; sense; discretion. [Colloq.] To knock him about the sconce with a dirty shovel. Shak.

A poll tax; a mulct or fine. Johnson.

A protection for a light; a lantern or cased support for a candle; hence, a fixed hanging or projecting candlestick. Tapers put into lanterns or sconces of several-colored, oiled paper, that the wind might not annoy them. Evelyn. Golden sconces hang not on the walls. Dryden.

Hence, the circular tube, with a brim, in a candlestick, into which the candle is inserted.

A squinch.

A fragment of a floe of ice. Kane.

A fixed seat or shelf. [Prov. Eng.]

To shut up in a sconce; to imprison; to insconce. [Obs.] Immure him, sconce him, barricade him in 't. Marston.

To mulct; to fine. [Obs.] Milton.