a. [f. L. circumferenti-a CIRCUMFERENCE + -AL.]
1. Of, pertaining to, or of the nature of the circumference.
1610. Healey, St. Aug. Citie of God, 584. Called Periœci, circumferentiall inhabitants.
1645. City Alarum, 9. Circumferentiall deliberations without any fixed center.
1658. W. Burton, Itin. Anton., 158. The circumferential inscription upon the reverse.
1678. Cudworth, Intell. Syst., I. v. 824. Circumferential Lines leading to this Center.
1715. trans. Pancirollus’ Rerum Mem., II. xvii. 383. How much a Circular or Circumferential Line is greater than a strait Line drawn through the Centre.
1859. Darwin, Orig. Spec., vii. (1878), 173. The circumferential flowers have their corollas much more developed than those of the centre.
1882. Nature, XXVII. 35. Strength [of a gun] to resist a bursting strain, which is called circumferential strength.
† 2. Circuitous, roundabout, indirect. Obs.
1662. Fuller, Worthies (1840), III. 125. Circumferential devices. Ibid., III. 406. He preferred death in a direct line before a circumferential passage thereunto.
Hence Circumferentially adv., in a circumferential way; in or upon the circumference.
1863. Huxley, Man’s Place Nat., § 2. 62. The yelk becomes circumferentially indented.
1882. Mayne Reid, in N. Y. Tribune, 24 May, 8. Dealing with the larger limbs, he … notches them circumferentially.
