Word.ws English Dictionary

theodolite

/θiːˈɒdəlaɪt/

theodolite noun: a surveying instrument, consisting of a small mounted telescope, used to measure horizontal and vertical angles.

Noun

theodolite (plural theodolites)

  1. A surveying instrument, consisting of a small mounted telescope, used to measure horizontal and vertical angles.
    • I drew outlines (according to my usual custom) of all the hills on the horizon before us, and took angles on them with the theodolite.c. 1839, T. L. Mitchell, Three Expeditions into the Interior of Eastern Australia, volume 2
    • The height of those mountains was from five to seven thousand feet above our level, by angular measurement with a theodolite.1839, Robert FitzRoy, Phillip Parker King, Narrative of the Surveying Voyages of His Majesty’s Ships Adventure and Beagle, between the Years 1826 and 1836, […], volume II, London: Henry Colburn, […]...

theodolite meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Odia and Indonesian

theodolite in Hindi

instrument
थियोडोलाइट thiyoḍolāiṭ, थिओडोलाइट thioḍolāiṭ

theodolite in Tamil

instrument
தியோடலைட்டு tiyōṭalaiṭṭu

theodolite in Odia

instrument
ଥିଓଡ଼ୋଲାଇଟ thioṛolāiṭa

theodolite in Indonesian

instrument
teodolit
More languagesFewer languages
theodolite in Persian
تئودولیت te'odolit
theodolite in Vietnamese
máy kinh vĩ
theodolite in Myanmar
သီအိုဒိုလိုက် siuiduiluik

Examples of theodolite in a sentence

  • It was a lieutenant and a couple of privates of the 8th Hussars, with a stand like a theodolite, which the artilleryman told me was a heliograph.1895–1897, H[erbert] G[eorge] Wells, “What I Saw of the Destruction of Weybridge and Shepperton”, in The War of the Worlds, London: William...
  • The process of setting up a theodolite is carried out in three stages: centring the theodolite, levelling the theodolite and elimination of parallax.2018, John Uren, Bill Price, Surveying for Engineers, Bloomsbury, →ISBN, page 79:

Forms of theodolite

pluraltheodolites

Origin of theodolite

From New Latin theodolitus (1571), perhaps containing Ancient Greek θέᾱ (théā, “sight, view”) and Arabic العِضَادَة (al-ʕiḍāda, “astrolabe, alidade”); if so, doublet of alidade.

Words formed from theodolite

Questions about theodolite

What does theodolite mean?
Theodolite means a surveying instrument, consisting of a small mounted telescope, used to measure horizontal and vertical angles.
What is theodolite in Hindi?
Theodolite in Hindi is थियोडोलाइट (thiyoḍolāiṭ), थिओडोलाइट (thioḍolāiṭ). See Theodolite meaning in Hindi.
How do you use theodolite in a sentence?
It was a lieutenant and a couple of privates of the 8th Hussars, with a stand like a theodolite, which the artilleryman told me was a heliograph.
What part of speech is theodolite?
Theodolite is a noun.
How do you pronounce theodolite?
Theodolite is pronounced /θiːˈɒdəlaɪt/.
What is the plural of theodolite?
The plural of theodolite is theodolites.

Words near theodolite in the dictionary

  1. theodicity
  2. theodicy
  3. theodidact
  4. Theodism
  5. theodiversity
  6. theodolite
  7. theodolites
  8. theodolitic
  9. Theodor
  10. Theodora
  11. Theodore

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: theodolite (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-theodolite.wav.

Cite this entry: “theodolite.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/theodolite. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.