▪ I. monument, n.
(ˈmɒnjʊmənt)
Forms: 4–5 monyment, 4–6 monumente, 6–7 moniment, 3– monument.
[ad. L. monu-, moniment-um something that reminds, a memorial, monument, f. monēre to remind: see -ment. Cf. F. monument, Sp., Pg., It. monumento.]
† 1. A sepulchre, place of sepulture. Obs.
[The earliest recorded sense in Eng.; repr. a late L. development of the sense as in 5 b, which was adopted later. Cf. Welsh mynwent (a. L. monumentum), graveyard.]
| a 1300 Cursor M. 16904 Þe prince o preistes o þair lagh went to þat monument, And sperd it wit a mikel stan. 13.. Evang. Nicod. 723 in Archiv Stud. neu. Spr. LIII. 404 He wand þat cors..And layd it in his monument. c 1450 Mirour Saluacioun 3403 The dore of the monument was stopped with a grete stone. 1526 Pilgr. Perf. (W. de W. 1531) 228 All y{supt} be in theyr monumentes, or graues, shall heare the voyce of the sone of god. 1592 Shakes. Rom. & Jul. iii. v. 203 In that dim Monument where Tybalt lies. 1611 Bible Isa. lxv. 4 A people..Which remaine among the graues, and lodge in the monuments. 1658 Sir T. Browne Hydriot. ii. (1736) 31 The Saints we observe arose from Graves and Monuments. [Echoing Vulg. Matt. xxvii. 53.] |
| fig. c 1380 Wyclif Wks. (1880) 299 Wo be to you, pharisies,..þat ben but hud monumentis. |
2. a. A written document, record; a legal instrument. (
App. sometimes confused with
muniment.)
| c 1440 Promp. Parv. 342/2 Monyment, or charterys, or oþer lyke, munimentum. 1559 Morwyng Evonym. 332 Leaninge to the moniments and sayings of Paulus ægineta. 1563 Foxe (title) Acts and Monuments of these latter and perillous Dayes. 1631 Gouge God's Arrows iii. §65. 303 Their rolles in which they recorded their monuments. 1685 Stillingfl. Orig. Brit. i. 4 Gildas..sadly laments the want of any Domestick Monuments, to give him certain information. 1709 Strype Ann. Ref. I. iv. 84 This discourse of Guest..I have transcribed from the original, and put in among the monuments in the end of the book. ? 1757 Burke Abridgm. Eng. Hist. iii. ix. Wks. 1812 V. 727 All our monuments bear a strong evidence to this change [in the laws]. 1868 M. Pattison Academ. Org. v. 184 The critical study of the monuments of Roman and Feudal Law may justly claim no inconsiderable share in our endowments. |
† b. A piece of information given in writing.
† monuments of letters (
= Renaissance Latin
monumenta litterarum): information furnished by documents.
| 1555 Eden Decades 283 But when Demetrius was demaunded whether eyther by the monumentes of letters or by fame lefte theym of theyr predecessours they hadde any knowleage of the gothes. c 1560 R. Morice in Lett. Lit. Men (Camden) 24 Suche papers of monuments as I hadd in my custodie concernyng the furnyture of your Ecclesiasticall storye. 1650 Stapylton Strada's Low C. Warres vii. 40, I can promise many Animadversions concerning them, out of the Monuments of Letters in my hands. |
3. a. An indication, evidence, or token (of some fact). Now
rare.
| 1605 Rowlands Hell's Broke Loose 4 For Fatus the Gouernour of Iury ouertooke Theudas, and sent his head as a monument to Ierusalem. 1672 Petty Pol. Anat. (1691) 25 There is at this Day no Monument or real Argument that, when the Irish were first invaded, they had any Stone-Housing at all. 1711 Wallis in J. Greenwood's Eng. Gram. Pref. 4 Other Books..where may be found many Monuments of uncommon Learning. 1903 Matheson Repr. Men of Bible 93 They came to Aaron to ask a sign—a visible monument of the Divine Presence. |
† b. Something serving to identify; a mark, indication; something that gives warning, a portent.
| 1590 Spenser F.Q. i. v. 38 His goodly corps..Was quite dismembred, and his members chast Scattered on every mountaine as he went, That of Hippolytus was lefte no moniment. Ibid. ii. xii. 80 His brave shield, full of old moniments, Was fowly ras't, that none the signes might see. 1596 Shakes. Tam. Shr. iii. ii. 97 Wherefore gaze this goodly company, As if they saw some wondrous monument, Some Commet, or vnusuall prodigie? 1656 tr. Hobbes' Elem. Phil. (1839) 13 For acquiring of philosophy, some sensible moniments are necessary, by which our past thoughts may be not only reduced, but also registered every one in its own order. 1657 Thornley tr. Longus' Daphnis & Chloe 205 Laius has shewed the monuments [orig. γνωρίσµατα] thou hadst about thee. |
c. U.S. Law. Any object, natural or artificial, fixed permanently in the soil and referred to in a document as a means of ascertaining the location of a tract of land or any part of its boundaries.
| 1828–32 in Webster. 1858 J. Kent Comm. Amer. Law (ed. 9) IV. 546 In the description of the land conveyed, the rule is, that known and fixed monuments control courses and distances. |
4. a. Anything that by its survival commemorates a person, action, period, or event.
| c 1530 Tindale Answ. More Wks. (1573) 283/1 For our false fayth in visityng the monumentes of Christ, therefore hath God also destroyed them. 1596 Spenser State Irel. Wks. (Globe) 628/1 Is there any token, denomination, or monument of the Gaules yet remaynyng in Ireland? 1618 Bolton Florus (1636) 92 He razed Saguntus to the ground, an ancient rich City of Spaine, and a great, but grievous moniment of her truth, and faith to the Romans. 1769 De Foe's Tour Gt. Brit. IV. 130 Many Monuments of this Battle are still to be seen here. 1837 J. Phillips Geol. 5 It is not certain that monuments remain of all the changes which have occured. 1876 E. Mellor Priesth. vi. 280 The Supper becomes thus a historic objective monument. |
b. An enduring evidence or example.
| 1675 Strange News from Oakingham 5 We..do deserve, no more mercie at his hands than other the Monuments of his Exemplary Justice. 1713 Addison Cato iii. ii, One..Who pants for breath, and stiffens, yet alive, In dreadful looks: a monument of wrath! 1789 Gibbon Autobiog. (1896) 154, I wished to have observed a country, the monument of freedom and industry. 1820 Hazlitt Lect. Dram. Lit. 40 It may be considered as a monument of the taste and skill of the authors. 1853 Kane Grinnell Exp. xxxiv. (1856) 299 They [ice-bergs] were beautiful objects, monuments of power. |
c. Applied, like
mod.F.
monument, to outstanding survivals of an early literature.
| 1852 E. A. Andrews Copious Latin-Eng. Lex. App. A. 1653 (title) Specimens of the oldest monuments of the Latin language. 1897 W. P. Ker Epic & Romance ii. 183 Beowulf is, at any rate, the specimen by which the Teutonic epic poetry must be judged. It is the largest monument extant. 1949 G. K. Anderson Lit. Anglo-Saxons iii. 63 Unquestionably the most important monument of Old English epic literature..is the poem Beowulf. |
5. a. A structure, edifice, or erection intended to commemorate a notable person, action, or event.
the Monument: a Doric column 202 feet in height, built in the City of London (1671–77) after the design of Sir C. Wren, to commemorate the great fire of London, 1666, which originated in a house 202 feet from the site of the column.
| 1602 Warner Alb. Eng. Epit. (1612) 365 Their edifying and sumptuous Erections of all our chiefe Minsters, Monasteries, and Monuments. 1645 Evelyn Diary 26 Feb., This monument [i.e. the Forum Trajanum] being at first set up on a rising ground. 1685 Ibid. 17 June, At this time the words engraved on the monument in London, intimating that the Papists fir'd the Citty, were erased and cut out. 1701 Lond. Gaz. No. 3718/4 Mr. Jer. Wayte, Fishmonger, near the Monument in New Fish street, London. 1842 Barham Ingol. Leg. Ser. ii. Misadv. Margate, And now I'm here, from this here pier it is my fixed intent To jump, as Mister Levi did from off the Monu-ment! 1864 Bryce Holy Rom. Emp. xvi. (1875) 284 Over all rose those two monuments of the best of the heathen Emperors..the columns of Marcus Aurelius and Trajan. |
b. A structure of stone or other lasting material erected in memory of the dead, either over the grave or in some part of a sacred edifice. (
Cf. 1.)
| 1588 Shakes. Tit. A. i. i. 350 Traytors away, he rest's not in this Tombe: This Monument fiue hundreth yeares hath stood, Which I haue Sumptuously re-edified. 1683–4 in Swayne Sarum Churchw. Acc. (1896) 346 Setting up y⊇ monument of Mrs. Ray. 1771 Junius' Lett. liv. (1820) 286 Honours shall gather round his monument. 1860 J. W. Warter Sea-board II. 183 Sometimes the dead were buried in haste, and Monuments were erected..on the sides of the public roads. 1903 Morley Gladstone II. v. ix. 157 He found the speech for a monument to Lord Palmerston in the Abbey ‘a delicate and difficult duty’. |
† c. A carved figure, statue, effigy.
Obs. (Often in
Shakes.)
| 1593 Shakes. Lucr. 391 Where, like a vertuous Monument shee lies, To be admir'd of lewd vnhallowed eyes. 1601 ― All's Well iv. ii. 5 If the quicke fire of youth light not your minde, You are no Maiden but a monument. 1601 Holland Pliny II. 567 At Rome there bee divers peeces of Praxiteles his making..standing among the monuments and bookes within the librarie of Asinius Pollio. 1611 Shakes. Cymb. ii. ii. 32 O sleepe, thou Ape of death, lye dull vpon her, And be her Sense but as a Monument, Thus in a Chappell lying. |
† 6. abstr. in monument of: in commemoration of.
| 1613 Purchas Pilgrimage (1614) 695 At the foot thereof was a great heape of Elephants teeth,..vpon them were set the skulls of dead men, which they had slaine in the warres, in monument of their victorie. |
7. attrib. and
Comb., as
monument-builder,
monument-maker;
monument-like adj.;
† monument candlestick, a candlestick fashioned after the model of the Monument (see 5 above);
Monument City = Monumental City;
† monument-money, money collected from visitors to Westminster Abbey who were shown the monuments.
| 1654 Whitlock Zootomia 409 All more or lesse strive at a Perpetuity of their Names; though let me say in a more Preposterous way, than these *Monument-Builders do. |
| 1688 Lond. Gaz. No. 2316/4 A pair of *Monument Candlesticks. |
| 1856 Life Illustrated 31 May 33/4 Baltimore is the ‘*Monument City’, from the great battle monument, and several others of note, within its limits. 1906 Springfield (Mass.) Weekly Republ. 8 Mar. 4 Baltimore has been known for years as the ‘Monument City’, and some of these monuments are in reality works of art. |
| 1886 A. Winchell Walks Geol. Field 42 A striking *monument-like remnant of a formation that once covered the whole of this high plateau. Ibid. 55 Many a monument-like outlier. |
| 1665 J. Webb Stone-Heng (1725) 86 These were..their barbarous *Monument-makers. |
| 1655–6 in Athenæum 9 Aug. (1884) 187/1 The Counsell was moved this day,..that those who have the..disposing of the *monument money at Westm{supr}, may be directed to dispose the same..to the maintainance of five Masters of Musicke. |
Add:
[5.] d. A structure, edifice, or the like surviving from a past age; an ‘ancient monument’ (see
ancient a. 4 c).
| 1880 [see ancient a. 4 c]. 1932, etc. [see henge n.2]. 1979 H. Kissinger White House Years xxiv. 1066 A string of Presidential visits to the architectural and artistic monuments of China's past: the Great Wall, the Forbidden City, the Ming Tombs, [etc.]. 1988 Daily Tel. (Colour Suppl.) 6 Aug. p. ii/2 Its [sc. Rome's] monuments, sacred or profane, have always been built to accommodate, or to overawe, a multitude. |
e. transf. Something that serves as a symbol of or witness
to a way of life, characteristic attitude, etc.
| 1937 Maine (Federal Writers' Project) 20a Visible monuments to the early struggles of the pioneers to establish themselves on the first frontiers of America are the old forts with their stockades and blockhouses. 1952 Observer 30 Nov. 5/4 The Pentagon, that immense monument to modern man's subservience to the desk. 1973 E. F. Schumacher Small is Beautiful ii. iv. 127 Disused nuclear power stations will stand as unsightly monuments to unquiet man's assumption that nothing but tranquillity, from now on, stretches before him. 1987 D. Rowe Beyond Fear v. 181 Psychiatric hospitals are monuments to the destruction of the human spirit. |
▪ II. monument, v. (
ˈmɒnjʊmənt)
[f. prec. Cf. F. monumenté placed on official record.] trans. In various nonce-uses: To cause to be perpetually remembered; to record on a monument; to furnish with a monument.
| 1606 Ford Honor Tri. (Shaks. Soc.) 24 Unspotted Lucrece who..monumented her rape with extremity of death. 1660 Waterhouse Arms & Arm. 36 They had their Arcus Triumphales, in which..were monumented the Victories of those to whose memory those piles of fame were erected. 1756 H. Walpole Let. to Bentley Aug., The poor woman..passed her whole widowhood..in collecting and monumenting the portraits and relics of all the great families from which she descended. 1856 Hawthorne Eng. Note-bks. (1870) II. 86 The ecclesiastical dignitaries bury themselves and monument themselves to the exclusion of almost everybody else. |