rostrum
Other forms: rostra; rostrums
You've probably listened to speakers who stood on a raised platform, or watched the winners in sports competitions step up onto a platform to accept their awards. The platform they're standing on is called a rostrum.
Rostrum, originally "animal snout or bird's beak" in Latin, has a back-and-forth history. The word came to be used for the battering beak at a warship’s bow. The ancient Romans used beaks from captured ships to decorate a platform from which orators could speak, called the rostra, the plural of rostrum. In the mid-17th century, rostrum came to mean a platform for speeches, performances, or receiving awards. By the way, the plural of rostrum is still rostra.
-
a platform raised above the surrounding level to give prominence to the person on it
-
beaklike projection of the anterior part of the head of certain insects such as e.g. weevilssynonyms: snouttype of:nose, olfactory organthe organ of smell and entrance to the respiratory tract; the prominent part of the face of man or other mammals
- MLA
- APA
- Chicago
Vocabulary lists containing rostrum
In J.D. Salinger's classic novel, Holden Caulfield leaves his prep school and experiences disillusionment and alienation while wandering around New York City.
The full title of this declaration includes a focus on citizenship, and it was published two years after the declaration of rights for men and immediately after the National Assembly of France rejected a proposal to extend the rights to women. With an ironic tone, the writer and activist Olympe de Gouges dedicated it to Marie Antoinette, who -- as a woman -- was not seen as an equal. And, as a queen, she did nothing to promote gender equality (yet she was eventually given a trial and death sentence equal to that of King Louis XVI). While a postscript and form for a social contract are also included, the main structure and contents of this declaration parallel and parody its male counterpart. Compare these lists to hear the echoes. E-text available here. Here are links to our lists on rights: The Declaration of Independence, Declaration of the Rights of Man, Declaration of the Rights of Woman, The Universal Declaration of Human Rights
Translated by Matthew Ward, Camus’s seminal 1942 novel follows Meursault — a young Frenchman in Algeria — who is condemned for his unemotional response to the death of his mother.