Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun The top stone of a structure or wall.
  • noun The crowning achievement or final stroke; the culmination or acme.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun In architecture, the uppermost or finishing stone of a structure, as of a parapet, a turret, etc.
  • noun In zoöl, a fossil echinite (sea-urchin) of the genus Conulus: so named from its resemblance to a cap.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun (Paleon.) A fossil echinus of the genus Cannulus; -- so called from its supposed resemblance to a cap.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun Any of the stones making up the top layer of a wall; a coping stone
  • noun A crowning achievement, culmination or finishing touch

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun a stone that forms the top of wall or building
  • noun a final touch; a crowning achievement; a culmination

Etymologies

Sorry, no etymologies found.

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word capstone.

Examples

  • Colleges also could promote "high-effort" practices across the curriculum, such as challenging freshman seminars, writing-intensive courses, undergraduate research assignments, service learning and long-term "capstone" projects.

    Eight ways to get higher education into shape 2011

  • Zechariah then instructed him to bring out the capstone, which is the final piece of stone set aside to mark completion of the temple.

    It’s Your Time Joel Osteen 2010

  • Where your capstone is a detailed, immaculately researched document, a presentation has to keep to a strict time limit, usually around 20 minutes.

    2010 April « worlds in a grain of sand 2010

  • Where your capstone is a detailed, immaculately researched document, a presentation has to keep to a strict time limit, usually around 20 minutes.

    2010 April 30 « worlds in a grain of sand 2010

  • Where your capstone is a detailed, immaculately researched document, a presentation has to keep to a strict time limit, usually around 20 minutes.

    Don’t Pull An ‘Afghanistan Stability / COIN Dynamics – Development’ « worlds in a grain of sand 2010

  • Zechariah then instructed him to bring out the capstone, which is the final piece of stone set aside to mark completion of the temple.

    It’s Your Time Joel Osteen 2010

  • Zechariah then instructed him to bring out the capstone, which is the final piece of stone set aside to mark completion of the temple.

    It’s Your Time JOEL OSTEEN 2009

  • Image from Paradigmshift, which has some interesting commentary and comparisons between the ancient Egyptian imagery and ancient Indian imagery of the creation myth; the stone is identified as a capstone found at Dashur and said to have been the capstone of the Bent Pyramid, no provenance given or where the photo was taken.

    New Artifact Found Near Bosnian "Pyramid" Jan 2008

  • Image from Paradigmshift, which has some interesting commentary and comparisons between the ancient Egyptian imagery and ancient Indian imagery of the creation myth; the stone is identified as a capstone found at Dashur and said to have been the capstone of the Bent Pyramid, no provenance given or where the photo was taken.

    Archive 2008-09-01 Jan 2008

  • The last top stone on the towers, called the capstone, was laid April 6, 1892.

    A Young Folks' History of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints Nephi Anderson 1894

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.

  • In the background of his thoughts Theron had carried along a notion of going and dining with Father Forbes when the time for the evening meal should arrive. The idea in itself attracted him, as a fitting capstone to his resolve not to go home to supper.

    - Harold Frederic, The Damnation of Theron Ware, ch. 26

    August 8, 2008

  • With that in mind, those who have not read the Quran will see that it is a capstone to all the Scriptures of the West: Jewish, Christian, and Muslim; all of which share the same God, but use different metaphors by which to worship YHWH, the Trinity, or Allah.

    March 1, 2018