[f. TOPO- + -LOGY. Cf. F. topologique adj., Littré, related to sense 1 b.] A term meaning ‘science of place,’ which has been tentatively proposed or used in various senses.
1. † a. The department of botany that treats of the localities where plants are found. Obs.
1659. Lovell, Compl. Herball, Pref. The Topologie or place of gathering them. Thus, Herbes, are to be gathered in mountaines, hills and plain places.
† b. The art of assisting the memory by associating the thing to be remembered with some place or building, the parts of which are well known. Obs.
1860. Worcester cites Fleming. Hence in later Dicts.
c. Geom.: see quots.
1883. Nature, 1 Feb., 316/2. The term Topology was introduced by Listing to distinguish what may be called qualitative geometry from the ordinary geometry in which quantitative relations chiefly are treated.
1895. Funk’s Standard Dict. Topology … 2. Geom. The geometrical theory of situation without respect to size or shape, including the theory of knots in a closed curve and the relations of the bounding parts of a solid.
d. Anat.: see quot.
1899. Syd. Soc. Lex., Topology, topographic anatomy. The relation of the presenting part of the fœtus to the pelvic canal.
2. The scientific study of a particular locality: see quot. 19051.
1850. S. Tymms, Bury Wills (Camden), Introd. 12. The selection of wills … has been made more with a view to illustrate the peculiar customs and language of the period than the topology or genealogy of the district.
1902. Cassell’s Encycl. Dict. Suppl., Topology, the study of the places or localities in a given district.
1903. Cornh. Mag., Feb., 251. The fact that topology is not synonymous with topography, but bears the same relation to topography as geology does to geography.
1905. Q. Rev., April, 346. The comparatively new study of topology, the science by which, from the consideration of geographical facts about a locality, one can draw deductions as to its history.
1905. Spectator, 10 June, 856/1. We need a knowledge not only of topography, but … of that … sister science which has been christened ‘topology.’
So Topologic, -ical adjs., of or pertaining to topology, chiefly in sense 2 (hence Topologically adv.); Topologist, one versed in topology.
1872. M. Collins, in Lett. & Friendships, I. 113. I might go on with *topologic lore, Until you voted me an awful bore.
1903. Cornh. Mag., Feb., 259. The topologic compass keeps his prow true.
1715. M. Davies, Athen. Brit., I. 183. Another noted Historian … publish’d two *Topological Pamphlets, containing the Description of Britanny and Ireland. Ibid. (1716), III. Diss. Physick, 37. Ancient Chiron … the most direct Predecessor, at least in the topological Line, of the Great Hippocrates.
1836. For. Q. Rev., XVII. 286. Except the following somewhat ingenious topological (not phrenological) explanation of Richter’s genius.
1903. Times, 4 April, 7/2. The Azores … have a topological importance.
1716. M. Davies, Athen. Brit., III. Diss. Physick, 12. They were distinguish’d *topologically or Geographically.
1903. Cornh. Mag., Feb., 258. The French *topologist has shown that the Odyssey is subsequent to a vanished Phœnician sea power.
1905. Spectator, 10 June, 856/1. To the topographist … the site … is a mystery; to the topologist … it is full of meaning.
