Meaning

6 senses
  1. Any of the corner building blocks of a building, usually larger or more ornate than the surrounding blocks.

  2. The keystone of an arch.

    the keystone of an arch

  3. (historical)A metal wedge which fits into the space between the type and the edge of a chase, and is tightened to fix the metal type in place.

    expandable metal or wooden wedge used by printers to lock up a form within a chase

  4. A wedge of wood or iron put under the breech of heavy guns or the muzzle of siege-mortars to raise them to the proper level.

  5. A number of apple varieties with a distinctive ribbed appearance, like corners of a coin.

  6. (obsolete)A form of wedge used to prevent casks from moving.

Translations

1 languages

Origin

Variant of coin; compare coign.

Variant of coin; compare coign.

Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0 · source

Forms

plural: quoins
Singularquoin
Pluralquoins

regular

Synonyms

4 synonyms
corner block of a building:cornerstoneB2
Close in meaning
  • the keystone of an arch:coigncoigne
  • expandable metal or wooden wedge used by printers to lock up a form within a chase:coigncoigne
  • (architecture) solid exterior angle of a building; especially one formed by a cornerstone:corner

Word family

3 related words

See also

neighbours in the dictionary
quoin — meaning, examples, forms, synonyms | Krumeto