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telescope

UK/ˈtɛl.ɪ.skəʊp/US/ˈtɛl.əˌskoʊp/
nounB2Common in everyday speech and writing · #4,898 of 15,258leans written

Other forms: telescopes

A telescope is the long instrument that makes far stars look close. Look through the telescope, a radio telescope, point the telescope.

Aperture matters more than magnification, because the width of the opening decides how much light is gathered and therefore how faint an object can be seen. The word was coined in 1611 for Galileo's instrument. The Greek means far-seeing.

Andrew Dunn · CC BY-SA 2.0

Definitions of telescope

  1. 1nountelescopeAn instrument that makes distant objects look close.B2

    “Through the telescope, we could see the rings of Saturn.”

telescope is an instrument.

Where it comes from

Greek teleskopos means far-seeing, from tele, afar, plus skopein, to look. Coined in 1611 for Galileo's instrument.

  1. Ancient Greek

    τηλεσκόπος — far-seeing

  2. Latin

    tēlescopium

  3. English, today

    telescope

Built from

  • τῆλε · Ancient Greek — afar
  • σκοπέω · Ancient Greek — to look at

From tele- + -scope. From Latin tēlescopium, from Ancient Greek τηλεσκόπος (“far-seeing”), from τῆλε (“afar”) + σκοπέω (“to look at”). Coined in 1611 by the Greek mathematician Giovanni Demisiani for one of Galileo Galilei's instruments presented at a banquet at the Accademia dei Lincei. a doublet of Telescopium.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practised in Science & Space

Practise this word

telescope in the wild

  • The Hubble Space Telescope (HST or Hubble) is a space telescope that was launched into low Earth orbit in 1990 and remains in operation.

    Hubble Space Telescope

  • Hubble is the only telescope designed to be maintained in space by astronauts.

    Hubble Space Telescope

  • Each individual telescope can detect objects that are roughly four billion times fainter than what can be seen with the naked eye.

    Very Large Telescope

  • In 2022, the NSF announced the telescope would not be rebuilt, with an educational facility to be established on the site.

    Arecibo Observatory

  • Jodrell Bank Observatory in Cheshire, England, hosts a number of radio telescopes as part of the Jodrell Bank Centre for Astrophysics at the University of Manchester.

    Jodrell Bank Observatory

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From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.

Related words

  • telescope array