ROSTRUM • FREE-TRANSLATOR.COM • Definition of Rostrum

Add this Dictionary
to your website!
See more options...

/rˈɑstrəm/ Listen

noun

Rostrum n. (pl. L. rostra, E. rostrums)

1.

The beak or head of a ship.

2.

pl. (Rostra) (Rom. Antiq.) The Beaks; the stage or platform in the forum where orations, pleadings, funeral harangues, etc., were delivered; so called because after the Latin war, it was adorned with the beaks of captured vessels; later, applied also to other platforms erected in Rome for the use of public orators.

3.

Hence, a stage for public speaking; the pulpit or platform occupied by an orator or public speaker. "Myself will mount the rostrum in his favor."

4.

(Zool.)

(a)

Any beaklike prolongation, esp. of the head of an animal, as the beak of birds.

(b)

The beak, or sucking mouth parts, of Hemiptera.

(c)

The snout of a gastropod mollusk.

(d)

The anterior, often spinelike, prolongation of the carapace of a crustacean, as in the lobster and the prawn.

5.

(Bot.) Same as Rostellum.

6.

(Old Chem.) The pipe to convey the distilling liquor into its receiver in the common alembic.

7.

(Surg.) A pair of forceps of various kinds, having a beaklike form. (Obs.)

See images of 'Rostrum'

Etymology of 'Rostrum'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

Share |

"Rostrum" Quotes from Famous Books

... excitement. The betting is tremendous, and fat wads of dollar bills are produced from the shabbiest of coats, whose owners one would hardly associate with such an amount of portable wealth. The three umpires sit together on a sort of rostrum, each one crowned with the national Basque "beret." Points are being continually referred to their decision, amidst the shouts and yells of the excited partisans. Every time the three umpires stand up, remove their berets, and make low bows to each other; ...

— Here, There And Everywhere • Lord Frederic Hamilton

... hour, I have been more subjected to envy. "Our son of fortune here, says every body, witnessed the shows in company with [Maecenas], and played with him in the Campus Martius." Does any disheartening report spread from the rostrum through the streets, whoever comes in my way consults me [concerning it]: "Good sir, have you (for you must know, since you approach nearer the gods) heard any thing relating to the Dacians?" "Nothing at all for my part," [I reply]. "How you ever are a sneerer!" "But may all the gods torture ...

— The Works of Horace • Horace

... prayer was over the superintendent, in full dress uniform, stepped to the front of the rostrum and made a brief address. Sailors are seldom long-winded talkers. The superintendent's address, on this very formal occasion, lasted barely four minutes. But what he said was full of earnest manhood ...

— Dave Darrin's Fourth Year at Annapolis • H. Irving Hancock

... tempting lengths of blackboard, charming colored prints hung up in artistic disarray, with globes in the corners, modeling tables in convenient lights, a piano near the rostrum, and the ...

— Joyce's Investments - A Story for Girls • Fannie E. Newberry

... ROSTRUM (lit. a beak), a pulpit in the forum of Rome where the orators delivered harangues to the people, so called as originally constructed of the prows of war-vessels taken at the first naval battle in ...

— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood

Copyright © 2026 Free-Translator.com