monument
NounOpen English WordNet
Noun (3)monuments
- a structure erected to commemorate persons or eventsSynonyms: memorialType of structure, constructionKinds gravestone, brass, national monument, Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, pantheon, megalith, cenotaph, triumphal archExamples Washington Monument, Statue of Liberty, Lincoln Memorial, Great Pyramid of Giza
- an important site that is marked and preserved as public propertyType of site, land siteKinds market crossExamples Stonehenge
- a burial vault (usually for some famous person)Synonyms: repositoryType of burial chamber, sepulcher
What does it mean? Question 1 of today’s quiz
Webster's Dictionary (1913)
Origin: F., fr. L. monumentum, fr. monere to remind, admonish. See Monition, and cf. Moniment.
1. Something which stands, or remains, to keep in remembrance what is past; a memorial.
Of ancient British art A pleasing monument.— Ambrose Philips
Our bruised arms hung up for monuments.— William Shakespeare
2. A building, pillar, stone, or the like, erected to preserve the remembrance of a person, event, action, etc.; as, the Washington monument; the Bunker Hill monument. Also, a tomb, with memorial inscriptions.
On your family's old monument Hang mournful epitaphs, and do all rites That appertain unto a burial.— William Shakespeare
3. A stone or other permanent object, serving to indicate a limit or to mark a boundary.
4. A saying, deed, or example, worthy of record.
Acts and Monuments of these latter and perilous days.— or Fox, John Foxe
Synonyms: Memorial; remembrance; tomb; cenotaph.
Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913), from GCIDE 0.54
The Devil's Dictionary
The bones of Agammemnon are a show, And ruined is his royal monument,
but Agammemnon's fame suffers no diminution in consequence. The monument custom has its _reductiones ad absurdum_ in monuments "to the unknown dead" -- that is to say, monuments to perpetuate the memory of those who have left no memory.