Pendulum

//ˈpɛnd͡ʒələm// noun

noun ·Moderate ·High school level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    A body suspended from a fixed support so that it swings freely back and forth under the influence of gravity, commonly used to regulate various devices such as clocks.
  2. 2
    an apparatus consisting of an object mounted so that it swings freely under the influence of gravity wordnet
  3. 3
    A body suspended from a fixed support so that it swings freely back and forth under the influence of gravity, commonly used to regulate various devices such as clocks.; The tendency of a situation to oscillate (between two extremes). broadly

    "The pendulum can be seen to be swinging in favour of rail, as with each issue of RAIL comes news of further intermodal service expansion."

  4. 4
    A lamp, etc. suspended from a ceiling.
  5. 5
    A watch's guard-ring by which it is attached to a chain.

Synonyms

All synonyms
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Example

More examples

"In her latest works she lets the uncanny swing like a grotesque pendulum from the humorous into homelike cosiness and back again."

Etymology

Borrowed from the neuter of Latin pendulus (“hanging”).

Related phrases

Foucault pendulumFoucault's pendulumKater's pendulumSchuler pendulumWilberforce pendulumballistic pendulumcompensation pendulumcompound pendulumdouble penduluminvariable pendulumpendulum arbitrationpendulum clock

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.