Forms: 7 circk(e, cirke, circque, 6– cirque, 8– circ. [a. F. cirque (It. circo, Sp. circo), ad. L. circ-us: see CIRCUS.]

1

  1.  = CIRCUS 1.

2

1601.  Holland, Pliny, I. 195. To fight in the great cirque. Ibid. (1603), Plutarch’s Mor., 142. The grand-cirque, where the horse-running is held for the prize.

3

1642.  Rogers, Naaman, 857. A certaine spectacle upon the Circk or Theatre of Rome.

4

1770.  Langhorne, Plutarch (1879), I. 224/1. Around the plausive cirque.

5

1873.  Browning, Red Cott. Nt.-cap, 1036. Inside a ruin, fane or bath or cirque, Renowned in story.

6

  b.  Any circular space, esp. for games or the like.

7

1644.  Bulwer, Chirol., 105. The Horse Cirque … in Smith-field.

8

1697.  Dryden, Æneid, V. 720. The cirque he clears. The crowd withdrawn, an open plain appears.

9

1742.  Shenstone, Schoolmistr., xxx. 265. Like a rushing torrent out they fly, And now the grassy cirque han cover’d o’er.

10

1774.  Warton, Hist. Eng. Poetry (1840), I. p. xix., note Circs of the same sort are still to be seen in Cornwall, so famous at this day for the athletick art.

11

1855.  M. Arnold, Tristram & Iseult (1877), I. 219. This cirque of open ground Is light and green.

12

  c.  = CIRCUS 2. (Chiefly as proper name.)

13

1845.  Athenæum, 22 Feb., 204. Singing classes are to take place in the Cirque.

14

1889.  Glasgow Herald, 11 March, 6/8. Mr. Joseph Hamilton … opened a short season at Hengler’s Cirque on Saturday evening.

15

  2.  A natural amphitheater, or rounded hollow or plain encircled by heights; esp. one high up in the mountains at the head of a stream or glacier. [So in Fr.]

16

1874.  Dawkins, Cave Hunt., ii. 26. Large gulfs and cirques on the surface, which are sometimes filled with water.

17

1878.  A. C. Ramsay, Phys. Geog., xxiii. 362. It gathers on the mountain slopes, and in the large cirques or recesses.

18

1882.  Geikie, Text Bk. Geol., VII. 924. Subaerial forces … have … scarped the mountains into cliff and cirque.

19

  3.  A circle, ring, or circlet, of any sort. poetic.

20

1677.  Plot, Oxfordsh., 339. A single Cirque of stones without Epistyles or Architraves.

21

1757.  Dyer, Fleece, iii. 63. Scarce the cirque Need turn around.

22

1814.  Wordsw., White Doe, IV. 50. And cirque and crescent framed by wall Of close-clipt foliage.

23

1820.  Keats, Hyperion, II. 34. A dismal cirque Of Druid stones, upon a forlorn moor.

24

1834.  D’Israeli, Revolut. Ep., xlix. The cirque Binding dim Pluto’s brow.

25

  4.  attrib. and in Comb., as cirque-play, -show; cirque-couchant (nonce-wd.), lying coiled up in circles; † cirque-sight, circus show.

26

1820.  Keats, Lamia, I. 46. A palpitating snake, Bright, and *cirque-couchant in a dusty brake.

27

1606.  Holland, Sueton., 158 (R.). *Cirque-plaies and games.

28

1613.  T. Godwin, Rom. Antiq. (1658), 90. Touching these *cirque-shews.

29

1636.  Heylin, Sabbath, II. 103. For the Lords day … neither theater nor *cirquesight nor combatings with wilde beasts, should be used thereon.

30

1606.  Holland, Sueton., 158 (R.). The stately pompe of the *Cirque solemnities.

31