asteroid
Pronunciation: /ˈæst(ə)ɹɔɪd/
The English word “asteroid” has 3 meanings listed here.
noun
- A naturally occurring solid object, which is smaller than a planet and a dwarf planet, larger than a meteoroid and not a comet, that orbits a star and often has an irregular shape.
- In the Solar System, such a body that orbits within the orbit of Jupiter.
- Any member of the taxonomic class Asteroidea; a starfish.
Etymology
]Introduced by German–British astronomer William Herschel in 1802 upon the suggestion of classical scholar Charles Burney Jr. (1757–1817), the son of music historian Charles Burney, a friend of Herschel's. Probably coined as a learned borrowing from Ancient Greek ἀστεροειδής (asteroeidḗs, “starlike”), from ἀστήρ (astḗr, “celestial body”) + -ειδής (-eidḗs, adjective-forming suffix). By surface…
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Definitions are from Wiktionary, extracted by Kaikki.org, and are available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.