Other forms: gargoyles
A gargoyle is a carved monster that throws rainwater clear of a wall. A stone gargoyle, gargoyles on the roof, carved as a gargoyle.
It is a spout with a face: the water runs through the figure and out of its mouth, well away from the stonework. A carving with no spout is properly a grotesque rather than a gargoyle, though almost nobody keeps the distinction.
1noungargoyleA carved monster that throws rainwater clear of a wall.
“An ugly stone gargoyle with a wide open mouth stared down from the corner of the church roof.”
gargoyle is a carving.
Old French gargouille meant a throat or waterspout, imitating the sound of gargling. Gargle is its doublet.
Proto-Indo-European
*swel- — to drink, gulp, swallow
Proto-Germanic
*swiljaną — to gulp, swallow
Proto-West Germanic
*swilljan
Old French
gargouille
English, today
gargoyle
From Old French gargouille, from Latin. a doublet of gargle. The Académie Française suggests the first attestation as gargoule in 1294.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA