Scaffold
noun, verb ·Moderate ·College level
Definitions
- 1 A structure made of scaffolding for workers to stand on while working on a building.
"1. A scaffold must be able to hold four times the load it is expected to carry. / 2. The footing for a scaffold must be level and solid and must not have motion when weight is applied. The scaffold must be level and plumb."
- 2 a temporary arrangement erected around a building for convenience of workers wordnet
- 3 An elevated platform on which a criminal is executed.
"The Begums' ministers, on the contrary, to extort from them the disclosure of the place which concealed the treasures, were, […] after being fettered and imprisoned, led out on to a scaffold, and this array of terrours proving unavailing, the meek tempered Middleton, as a dernier resort, menaced them with a confinement in the fortress of Chunargar. Thus, my lords, was a British garrison made the climax of cruelties!"
- 4 a platform from which criminals are executed (hanged or beheaded) wordnet
- 5 An elevated platform on which dead bodies are ritually disposed of, as by some Native American tribes.
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- 6 An accumulation of adherent, partly fused material forming a shelf or dome-shaped obstruction above the tuyeres in a blast furnace.
- 7 A structure that provides support for some other material.
"[T]he inventors of the present invention have found that the above-described recombinant gelatin contained in the scaffold for vascular endothelial cell migration according to the present invention markedly promotes migration of vascular endothelial cells. Therefore, use of the scaffold for vascular endothelial cell migration according to the present invention makes it possible to ensure that vascular endothelial cells migrate to a predetermined site to newly form blood vessels."
- 1 To set up a scaffolding; to surround a building with scaffolding. transitive
- 2 provide with a scaffold for support wordnet
- 3 To sustain; to provide support for. transitive
- 4 To dispose of the bodies of the dead on a scaffold or raised platform, as by some Native American tribes. transitive
Example
More examples"Outside the town a great scaffold had been erected, and all round were standing the soldiers, and hundreds of thousands of people. The King and Queen were sitting on a magnificent throne opposite the judges and the whole council."
Etymology
From Middle English scaffold, scaffalde, from Anglo-Norman schaffaut, eschaffaut, eschafal, eschaiphal, escadafaut (“platform to see a tournament”) (Modern French échafaud), from Old French es- (indicating movement away or separation) (from Latin ex- (“out, away”)) + chafaud, chafaut, chafault, caafau, caafaus, cadefaut (“scaffold for executing a criminal”), from Vulgar Latin *catafalcum (“viewing stage”), possibly from Ancient Greek κατα- (kata-, “back; against”) + Latin -falicum (from fala, phala (“wooden gallery or tower; siege tower”)).
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.