Definitions

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

  • noun Mathematics A fixed curve traversed by a generatrix in generating a conic section or a cylinder.
  • noun The median line in the trajectory of fire of an artillery piece.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun The first line traced on the ground in laying out a fortification.
  • noun A woman who governs or directs.
  • noun In mathematics, a fixed line, whether straight or not, that is required for the description of a curve or surface.
  • noun In gunnery, the center line in the plane of fire of an embrasure or platform. Tidball. See embrasure

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

  • noun rare A directress.
  • noun A line along which a point in another line moves, or which in any way governs the motion of the point and determines the position of the curve generated by it; the line along which the generatrix moves in generating a surface.
  • noun A straight line so situated with respect to a conic section that the distance of any point of the curve from it has a constant ratio to the distance of the same point from the focus.

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

  • noun A female who directs; a directress.
  • noun geometry A line used to define a curve or surface; especially a line, the distance from which a point on a conic has a constant ratio to that from the focus

Etymologies

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Examples

  • You probably feel at times like a chord of a conic section that passes through a focus and is parallel to the directrix, but know for certain that the phonemic differences between allormorphs of the same morpheme is supported by the idea that the quantitative measurement of many characters to the determination of taxa and to the construction of diagrams indicating systematic changes can make or break us.

    Trisomy Jeffrey S. Callico 2011

  • Reminds me of a certain directrix of my acquaintance ... *sentence trails off as the speaker begins to stammer*

    Madame Riccoboni Young Geoffrion 2009

  • The last story she would want circulating is one that makes her sound like Nazi film directrix Leni Riefenstahl brainstorming with Himmler and Goebbels over the specs for the Master Race's next generation.

    Jodie Foster's Eugenics Obsession Steve Sailer 2005

  • The last story she would want circulating is one that makes her sound like Nazi film directrix Leni Riefenstahl brainstorming with Himmler and Goebbels over the specs for the Master Race's next generation.

    Archive 2005-09-11 Steve Sailer 2005

  • The last story she would want circulating is one that makes her sound like Nazi film directrix Leni Riefenstahl brainstorming with Himmler and Goebbels over the specs for the Master Race's next generation.

    Is Jodie Foster a lesbian? America wants to know! Steve Sailer 2005

  • The last story she would want circulating is one that makes her sound like Nazi film directrix Leni Riefenstahl brainstorming with Himmler and Goebbels over the specs for the Master Race's next generation.

    Archive 2005-01-09 Steve Sailer 2005

  • More specifically, she looks like this drag queen, the indomitable porn directrix Chi Chi LaRue.

    Archive 2005-09-01 2005

  • My pal Lori, who works with me as the directrix of the school, brings her one-year-old daughter to the Pussy Palace every day, and we share a wonderful babysitter named Marti who looks after both girls.

    Mama Gena’s Marriage Manual Regena Thomashauer 2004

  • Deborah, our directrix of special projects, decided to become pregnant as soon as she started to work with us and saw how much more fun it is to be a mom when you have a gang of girlfriends by your side.

    Mama Gena’s Marriage Manual Regena Thomashauer 2004

  • They are in want of a directrix; and if we could supplement the gift with foci and centre, they would soon emerge from their savage condition, and become more civilized.

    The Romance of Mathematics Being the Original Researches of a Lady Professor of Girtham College in Polemical Science, with some Account of the Social Properties of a Conic; Equations to Brain Waves; Social Forces; and the Laws of Political Motion. P. Hampson

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