Also 5–6 -ent, 7 -an. [ad. L. quadrans, quadrant- fourth part, quarter (spec. of an as, an acre, a foot, a pound, a sextarius, a day; cf. the senses below), f. quadr- four-: see QUADRI-.]
† 1. A quarter of a day; six hours. Obs.
1398. Trevisa, Barth. De P. R., IX. ix. (1495), 354. A day conteynyth foure quadrantes, and a quadrant conteynyth syxe houres.
a. 1628. Sir J. Beaumont, End his Majesty’s 1st Yeare (R.). The sunne, who in his annuall circle takes A daye’s full quadrant from th’ ensuing yeere.
1646. Sir T. Browne, Pseud. Ep., 219. The intercalation of one day every fourth yeare, allowed for this quadrant, or 6 houres supernumerary.
† 2. The fourth part of a Roman as. Obs.
1533. Bellenden, Livy, III. vii. (1901), 270. Ilk man went to Valerius hous, and left ane quadrent in it, to caus him be the more richely buryit.
1601. Holland, Pliny, II. 518. A small piece of brasse coin, although it be no more than a Quadrant.
1655. Moufet & Bennet, Health’s Improv., 191. They were highly esteemed, being sold every Dishfull for fourscore Quadrants.
† b. A farthing. (So med.L. quadrans, AF. quadrant.) Obs.
1609. Skene, Reg. Maj., 123 b (Burgh Lawes c. 40). Hee … sall giue ane quadrant (farding). Ibid., 26 b (Burghe Lawes c. 66). The maister … sall haue ane pennie for his Ouen; the twa servants ane pennie, and the boy ane quadrant.
† c. attrib. in contemptuous sense. Obs.
1589. Nashe, Ded., to Greene’s Menaphon (Arb.), 8. Our quadrant Crepundios, that spit ergo in the mouth of euerie one they meete.
† 3. The fourth part of a sextarius or Roman pint. Obs. rare.
1601. Holland, Pliny, I. 267. One of their shels ordinarily would containe 80 measures called Quadrants.
1688. R. Holme, Armoury, III. 339/1. Gill or Quadran, is 4 to a pint.
4. A quarter of a circle or circular body, viz. (a) an arc of a circle, forming one fourth of the circumference; (b) one fourth of the area of a circle, contained within two radii at right angles.
1571. Digges, Pantom., I. B iv. A Quadrant is the fourth part of a Circle, included with two Semidiameters.
1625. N. Carpenter, Geog. Del., I. vi. (1635), 123. A circle … is diuided into foure quadrants.
1660. Barrow, Euclid, VI. 33 cor. As the arch BC is to four quadrants, that is, the whole circumference.
1694. Holder, Disc. Time, 62 (J.). In each Quadrant of the Circle of the Ecliptic.
1727–41. Chambers, Cycl., s.v. Quarter-round, Any projecting moulding, whose contour is a perfect quadrant.
1812. Woodhouse, Astron., i. 6. PQ, Pq [are] quadrants containing 90 degrees.
1843. Portlock, Geol., 682. In each quadrant of the kiln, there is an opening.
1869. Dunkin, Midn. Sky, 74. The north-western quadrant of the sky.
1900. Brit. Med. Jrnl. (No. 2046), 622. An insignificant nebula in the lower-inner quadrant of the left cornea.
b. A thing having the form of a quarter-circle.
Quadrant of Altitude, a graduated strip of brass on an artificial globe, fixed at one end to some point of the meridian, round which it revolves, and extending round one fourth of the circumference.
1638. Chilmead, trans. Hues’ Treat. Globes (1889), 33. Then fasten the quadrant of Altitude to the Vertical point.
1726. trans. Gregory’s Astron., I. 269. With the Quadrant of Altitude, find that Point of the Ecliptic which is elevated 12 Degrees above the Western Part of the Horizon.
1816. J. Smith, Panorama Sci. & Art, II. 717. A sliding piece N, (much like the nut of the quadrant of altitude belonging to a common globe).
1825. J. Nicholson, Operat. Mechanic, 114. The inclined shaft … working in the toothed quadrant Z, elevates or depresses the sluice.
1888. Jacobi, Printers’ Vocab., 107. Quadrant, a stall crescent-shaped piece of iron or steel used for the movement of the vibrating roller on a platen machine.
c. A quarter of a sphere or spherical body.
1882. Vines, trans. Sachs’ Bot., 300. In each of the four quadrants [of a cell] a third division takes place.
5. An instrument, properly having the form of a graduated quarter-circle, used for making angular measurements, esp. for taking altitudes in astronomy and navigation.
Various kinds of quadrants (some being improperly so called) have been employed for different purposes, but are now to a great extent superseded by more perfect instruments. The distinctive names are derived either from the inventors (as Adams’s, Coles’s, Collins’s, Davis’s, Godfrey’s or Hadley’s, Gunter’s, Sutton’s quadrant), from those by whom it is used (as gunner’s, surveyor’s quadrant), or from some property, use, etc., of the instrument (as horodictical, mural, sinical quadrant).
a. 1400. in Halliwell, Rara Mathematica (1841), 58. Til … þe threde whereon þe plumbe henges falle vpon þe mydel lyne of þe quadrant, þat es to say þe 45 degre.
a. 1400–50. Alexander, 129. Quadrentis [MS. In adrentis] corven all of quyte siluyre.
1555. Eden, Decades, 245. With my quadrant and Astrolabie instrumentes of Astronomie.
1627. Capt. Smith, Seaman’s Gram., xiv. 68. The Gunners quadrant is to leuell a Peece or mount her to any randon.
1638. Chilmead, trans. Hues’ Treat. Globes (1889), 102. Observe the Meridian Altitude of the Sunne with the crosse staffe, quadrant, or other like instrument.
1696. Phillips (ed. 5), David’s [1706 Davis’s] Quadrant, an Instrument us’d by Seamen, wherewith they observe the height of the Sun with their Backs toward it.
1774. M. Mackenzie, Maritime Surv., 10. With a Theodolite, or Hadley’s Quadrant … take the Angles YXA, YXB, YXC.
1848. Dickens, Dombey, iv. The stock in trade of this old gentleman comprised … sextants, and quadrants.
1898. F. T. Bullen, Cruise ‘Cachalot,’ 100. Anything … more out of date than his ‘hog-yoke,’ or quadrant, I have never seen.
6. attrib. and Comb., as quadrant cell, lever; quadrant-like, -shaped adjs.; quadrant-compass, a carpenter’s compass with an arc to which one leg may be screwed (Knight, Dict. Mech., 1875); quadrant-electrometer, an electrometer in which the index moves through a quarter of a circle; quadrant steam-engine, an engine in which the piston oscillates through a sector of a circle, instead sliding along a cylinder (Knight, Dict. Mech.).
1816. J. Smith, Panorama Sci. & Art, II. 247. This conductor should be furnished with a quadrant electrometer.
1833. J. Holland, Manuf. Metal, II. 278. The principle [of Strutt’s lock] … consists in a number of quadrant levers.
1874. Micklethwaite, Mod. Par. Churches, 163. The mediæval quadrant-shaped cope-chests.
1884. Bower & Scott, De Bary’s Phaner., 20. Each quadrant cell is again divided into two unequal parts.
1897. Outing (U.S.), XXIX. 525/1. The quadrant-like part of the shutter.
