Tower

How to spell tower

5 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce tower

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does tower mean?

1. nounA tall, narrow structure or building, often standing higher than its surroundings.
2. verbTo rise to or reach a great height above the surroundings.

Tower in a sentence

• noun

  The clock tower chimes every hour on the hour.

• verb

  The new flats tower over the older houses on the street.

• noun

  Tourists queued for two hours to climb the bell tower.

• verb

  The cliffs tower above the narrow beach below.

Where does tower come from?

Language of origin: Latin

Tower goes back to the Latin word turris, meaning a high, narrow building or fortification, which itself was likely borrowed from an ancient Mediterranean source. Old English took it in as 'torr', and the form was then reshaped under the influence of Old French 'tur' or 'tour' after the Norman Conquest, giving us the spelling with -ow- that we use today. The original sense was strictly a tall defensive structure, the kind that guarded a castle or city wall, and only later did it broaden to cover any soaring building. The verb meaning 'to rise high above' grew naturally out of the noun in the later medieval period. The same Latin turris also lies behind 'turret', the small tower on a castle or a tank, which is a handy reminder of where the word comes from. The spelling trap is the -ower ending, which sounds the same as in 'power' and 'flower' but can tempt writers toward 'tour' spellings.

How the word is built

• tower (from Latin turris, a tall structure); a single root word, no separable prefix or suffix