Word Direct Answers

What does "portal" mean?

Portal: (Arch.) (a) The lesser gate, where there are two of different dimensions. (b) Formerly, a small square corner in a room separated from the rest of the apartment by wainscoting, forming a short passage to another apartment. (c) By analogy with the French portail, used by recent writers for the whole architectural composition which surrounds and includes the doorways and porches of a church.

Additional senses

  1. 2.(Bridge Building) The space, at one end, between opposite trusses when these are terminated by inclined braces.
  2. 3.A prayer book or breviary; a portass. [Obs.] Portal bracing (Bridge Building), a combination of struts and ties which lie in the plane of the inclined braces at a portal, serving to transfer wind pressure from the upper parts of the trusses to an abutment or pier of the bridge.
  3. 4.Of or pertaining to a porta, especially the porta of the liver; as, the portal vein, which enters the liver at the porta, and divides into capillaries after the manner of an artery. Note: Portal is applied to other veins which break up into capillaries; as, the renal portal veins in the frog.

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