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tunnel

Pronunciation: /ˈtʌn(ə)l/

The English word “tunnel” has 13 meanings listed here.

noun

  1. An underground or underwater passage.
  2. A passage through or under some obstacle.
  3. A hole in the ground made by an animal, a burrow.
  4. A wrapper for a protocol that cannot otherwise be used because it is unsupported, blocked, or insecure.
  5. A vessel with a broad mouth at one end, a pipe or tube at the other, for conveying liquor, fluids, etc., into casks, bottles, or other vessels; a funnel.
  6. The opening of a chimney for the passage of smoke; a flue.
  7. A level passage driven across the measures, or at right angles to veins which it is desired to reach; distinguished from the drift, or gangway, which is led along the vein when reached by the tunnel.
  8. Anything that resembles a tunnel.

verb

  1. To make a tunnel through or under something; to burrow.
  2. To dig a tunnel.
  3. To transmit something through a tunnel (wrapper for an insecure or unsupported protocol).
  4. To insert a catheter into a vein to allow long-term use.
  5. To undergo the quantum-mechanical phenomenon where a particle penetrates through a barrier that it classically cannot surmount.

Etymology

From Middle English tonnel, from Old French tonel(e), diminutive of tone (“cask”), a word of uncertain origin and affiliation. Related to Old English tunne (“tun; cask; barrel”). More at tun.

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Definitions are from Wiktionary, extracted by Kaikki.org, and are available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.