Other forms: circulars
A circular is a notice sent out to everybody at once. Send a circular, an office circular, a circular letter.
It is the older word for what would now be a group email or a memo, and it survives in official and church use. As an adjective, circular means round, or going in a circle: a circular route, circular saw. A circular argument assumes what it is trying to prove, which is a named fallacy. Note circular economy, where materials are reused rather than discarded, which is a recent and deliberate use of the shape.
1nouncircularA notice sent out to everybody at once.
“The head teacher sent a circular to all parents about the new school hours.”
2adjectiveroundRound, or going in a circle.
“We followed a circular walk that brought us back to the car park.”
Too few real examples of this word to estimate which sense is commonest.
circular is a notice, or a round shape.
Latin circularis comes from circulus, a small ring, a diminutive of circus. The notice is called a circular because it was circulated — sent round.
Latin
circularis
Old French
circulier
Middle English
circuler
English, today
circular
Built from
From Middle English circuler, circuleer, circulere, from Old French circulier (French circulaire), from Latin circularis, from Latin circulus, diminutive of circus (“ring”). by surface analysis, circle + -ar.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA