n.
- An upright structure of masonry, wood, plaster, or other building material serving to enclose, divide, or protect an area, especially a vertical construction forming an inner partition or exterior siding of a building.
- A continuous structure of masonry or other material forming a rampart and built for defensive purposes. Often used in the plural.
- A structure of stonework, cement, or other material built to retain a flow of water.
- Something resembling a wall in appearance, function, or construction, as the exterior surface of a body organ or part: the abdominal wall.
- Something resembling a wall in impenetrability or strength: a wall of silence; a wall of fog.
- An extreme or desperate condition or position, such as defeat or ruin: driven to the wall by poverty.
- Sports. The vertical surface of an ocean wave in surfing.
- To enclose, surround, or fortify with or as if with a wall: wall up an old window. See synonyms at enclose.
- To divide or separate with or as if with a wall. Often used with off: wall off half a room.
- To confine or seal behind a wall; immure: "I determined to wall [the body] up in the cellar" (Edgar Allan Poe).
- To block or close (an opening or passage, for example) with or as if with a wall.
off the wall Slang.
- Extremely unconventional.
- Without foundation; ridiculous: an accusation that is really off the wall.
- Into a state of extreme frustration, anger, or distress: tensions that are driving me up the wall.
- An ominous indication of the course of future events: saw the writing on the wall and fled the country.
[Middle English, from Old English weall, from Latin vallum, palisade, from vallus, stake.]
wallless wall'less adj.
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition Copyright © 2007, 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2009. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
