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s of a line or surface from a rectilinear direction; a bend; a curve. Cowper. The elegant curvature of their fronds. Darwin.

rrant; a wandering from the right way; deviation from truth, rectitude, etc. Aberrancy of curvature (Geom.), the deviation of a curve from a circular form.

nce in government; as, the case absolute. See Ablative absolute, under Ablative. Absolute curvature (Geom.), that curvature of a curve of double curvature, which is measured in the osculating plane of the curve. -- Absolute equation (Astron.), the sum of the optic and eccentric equations. -- Absolute space (Physics),…

ces having different refractive and dispersive powers, as crown and flint glass, with the curvatures so adjusted that the chromatic aberration produced by the one is corrected by other, and light emerges from the compound lens undecomposed. -- Achromatic prism. See Prism. -- Achromatic telescope, or microscope, one i…

Curvature inwards; hookedness. The aduncity of the beaks of hawks. Pope.

Having to opposite curvatures, that is, curved longitudinally in one direction and transversely in the opposite direction, as the surface of a saddle.

Having two or more parts of different curvatures, so combined as to remove spherical aberration; -- said of a lens. Aplanatic focus of a lens (Opt.), the point or focus from which rays diverging pass the lens without spherical aberration. In certain forms of lenses there are two such foci; and it is by taking advantage…

The small hollow curvature given to the top or bottom of the shaft of a column where it expands to meet the edge of the fillet; -- called also the scape. Parker.

A curvature in the shape of a circular arc or an arch; as, the colored arc (the rainbow); the arc of Hadley's quadrant.

Any curvature in the form of an arch; as, the arch of the aorta. "Colors of the showery arch." Milton. Triumphal arch, a monumental structure resembling an arched gateway, with one or more passages, erected to commemorate a triumph.

Having a narrow, projecting chest, caused by forward curvature of the vertebral column.

er Accidental, Common, and Vocal. -- Chord of an arch. See Illust. of Arch. -- Chord of curvature, a chord drawn from any point of a curve, in the circle of curvature for that point. -- Scale of chords. See Scale.

A painful erection of the penis, usually with downward curvature, occurring in gonorrhea.

A bend, turn, or curve; curvature; flexure. Through lanes, and crooks, and darkness. Phaer.

es through all the other points of the curve. Any other curve is called a curve of double curvature, or a twisted curve.

ay, etc., without the aid of celestial observations. -- Dead rise, the transverse upward curvature of a vessel's floor. -- Dead rising, an elliptical line drawn on the sheer plan to determine the sweep of the floorheads throughout the ship's length. -- Dead-Sea apple. See under Apple. -- Dead set. See under Set. -…

-- Diminishing rule (Arch.), a board cut with a concave edge, for fixing the entasis and curvature of a shaft. -- Diminishing stile (Arch.), a stile which is narrower in one part than in another, as in many glazed doors.

wenty feet of ascent. -- Equating for curves, adding half a mile for each 360 degrees of curvature.

Without sudden change of direction or curvature; smooth; fowing; -- said of the figure of a vessel, and of surfaces, water lines, and other lines.

Having alternate curvatures in opposite directions; bent in a zigzag manner.