[a. L. crātēr bowl, basin, aperture of a volcano, a. Gr. κρᾱτήρ bowl, lit. ‘mixer, mixing-vessel,’ f. κερα-, κρα- to mix. (In French cratère is late, senses 1 and 2 being admitted by the Academy in 1762, 1798, respectively.)]
ǁ 1. Greek Antiq. ‘A large bowl in which the wine was mixed with water, and from which the cups were filled’ (Liddell & Scott). Also krater.
1730–6. Bailey (folio), Crater, a cup or bowl, a goblet.
1774. J. Bryant, Mythol., II. 236. The crater, or cup.
1857. Birch, Anc. Pottery (1858), I. 44. A kind of krater was used as a receptacle for the wine or water drawn from the amphoræ.
1866. J. B. Rose, Virg. Ecl. & Georg., 94. With crater ivy-bound Libations to Lenæus there be sheds.
2. A bowl- or funnel-shaped hollow at the summit or on the side of a volcano, from which eruption takes place; the mouth of a volcano.
1613. Purchas, Pilgrimage, VIII. ix. 657. The Vulcan, Crater, or Mouth whence fire issued, is about halfe a league in Compasse.
1752. Phil. Trans., XLVII. 355. The sides … form a concavity, or crater, resembling a truncated cone, with its base uppermost.
1860. Emerson, Cond. Life, Wealth, Wks. (Bohn), II. 349. The mountains and craters in the moon.
1867. Whittier, Abraham Davenport, 19. A dull glow, like that which climbs The crater’s sides from the red hell below.
ǁ 3. Astron. A southern constellation, situated between Hydra and Leo, west of Corvus.
1658. Phillips, Crater … called the bottom of the pitcher in Virgo, it riseth about the sixteenth of the Calends of March.
1890. C. A. Young, Uranography, § 38. About the middle of his [Hydra’s] length, and just below the hind feet of Leo … we find the little constellation of Crater.
4. Mil. The excavation or cavity formed by the explosion of a mine; the funnel.
1839. Penny Cycl., XV. 233/2. The dimensions of the crater or funnel formed by the explosion depend on the amount of the charge. Ibid. The ratio between the diameter of the crater and the length of the line of least resistance.
5. Electr. The cavity formed in the positive carbon of an arc light in the course of combustion.
1892. S. Thompson, in Electr. Engineer, 16 Sept., 281/2. At the surface of the positive electrode or crater.
6. Comb., as crater-formed, -like adjs., -rim, -wall.
1830. Lyell, Princ. Geol., I. 387. The cone and crater-like configuration … may sometimes have no reference whatever to ordinary volcanic eruptions.
1869. Phillips, Vesuvius, i. 6. Down the steep crater-walls.
1874. Lubbock, Wild Flowers, i. 6. Each leaflet produces honey in a crater-formed gland.
Hence Craterine a., = CRATERAL. Craterkin, a little crater. Craterless a., without a crater. Craterlet, a small crater; esp. applied to the smaller craters on the moon. Craterous a., of the nature of a crater, crater-like.
1888. L. Hearn, in Harper’s Mag., Sept., 629/1. The harbor of Castries, with its hills, seems of craterine origin.
1888. Pall Mall Gaz., 12 Sept., 2/2. There … was a small crater twenty feet wide…. The bottom of the craterkin was entirely closed.
1890. R. S. Ball, Story of Heavens, 67. Those comparatively craterless peaks.
1881. Eng. Mechanic, 27 May, 281/3. Close along this rill [on the moon] … are three craterlets.
1883. Piazzi Smith, in Nature, XXVII. 315. The craterlet which forms the tip-top of the Peak.
1856. Mrs. Browning, Aur. Leigh, VIII. 341. That June day Too deeply sunk in craterous sunsets now For you or me to dig it up.
