portcullis

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port·cul·lis

(pôrt-kŭl′ĭs)

A grating of iron or wooden bars or slats, suspended in the gateway of a fortified place and lowered to block passage.

[Middle English port-colice, from Old French porte coleice, sliding gate : porte, gate (from Latin porta; see per- in Indo-European roots) + coleice, feminine of coleis, sliding (from Vulgar Latin *cōlātīcius, from Latin cōlātus, past participle of cōlāre, to filter, strain, from cōlum, sieve).]

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

portcullis

(pɔːtˈkʌlɪs)

(Architecture) an iron or wooden grating suspended vertically in grooves in the gateway of a castle or fortified town and able to be lowered so as to bar the entrance

[C14 port colice, from Old French porte coleïce sliding gate, from porte door, entrance + coleïce, from couler to slide, flow, from Late Latin cōlāre to filter]

Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged, 12th Edition 2014 © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1994, 1998, 2000, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2011, 2014

port•cul•lis

(pɔrtˈkʌl ɪs, poʊrt-)

n.

a strong grating, as of iron, made to slide along vertical grooves at the sides of the gateway of a castle or fortified place and let down to prevent passage.

[1300–50; Middle English portecolys < Middle French porte coleice]

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Noun

portcullis - gate consisting of an iron or wooden grating that hangs in the entry to a castle or fortified town; can be lowered to prevent passage

gate - a movable barrier in a fence or wall

Translations

saracinesca

portcullis

[pɔːtˈkʌlɪs] N → rastrillo m

Collins Spanish Dictionary - Complete and Unabridged 8th Edition 2005 © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1971, 1988 © HarperCollins Publishers 1992, 1993, 1996, 1997, 2000, 2003, 2005

portcullis

[pɔː^rtˈkʌlɪs] n → herse f

Collins English/French Electronic Resource. © HarperCollins Publishers 2005

portcullis

n → Fallgitter nt, → Fallgatter nt

Collins German Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged 7th Edition 2005. © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1980 © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1997, 1999, 2004, 2005, 2007

portcullis

[pɔːtˈkʌlɪs] n → saracinesca

Collins Italian Dictionary 1st Edition © HarperCollins Publishers 1995

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References in classic literature ?

If you pry it up, so as to get it overhead, and expose its rows of teeth, it seems a terrific portcullis; and such, alas!

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Some thirty minutes later five hundred iron clad horses carried their mailed riders beneath the portcullis of the grim pile, and Norman the Devil, riding at their head, spurred rapidly in the direction of the castle of Peter of Colfax.

Shandy returned to his master with the reply, and together Norman of Torn and Bertrade de Montfort clattered across the drawbridge beneath the portcullis of the castle of the Earl of Leicester, brother-in-law of Henry III of England.

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They dismounted at a hostelry which Don Quixote recognised as such and did not take to be a castle with moat, turrets, portcullis, and drawbridge; for ever since he had been vanquished he talked more rationally about everything, as will be shown presently.

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The king was conducted to the castle with great pomp, and Fouquet saw him dismount under the portcullis, and say something in the ear of D'Artagnan, who held his stirrup.

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"Celluloid teeth, nine dollars a set, as like as not -- the loose-fit kind, that go up and down like a portcullis when you eat, and fall out when you laugh."

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The Count Luigi raised money, like the rest, and one mild September morning, armed with battle-ax, portcullis and thundering culverin, he rode through the greaves and bucklers of his donjon-keep with as gallant a troop of Christian bandits as ever stepped in Italy.

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It is certain that this monastery, which had a grand air, both as a church and as a seignory; that abbatial palace, where the bishops of Paris counted themselves happy if they could pass the night; that refectory, upon which the architect had bestowed the air, the beauty, and the rose window of a cathedral; that elegant chapel of the Virgin; that monumental dormitory; those vast gardens; that portcullis; that drawbridge; that envelope of battlements which notched to the eye the verdure of the surrounding meadows; those courtyards, where gleamed men at arms, intermingled with golden copes;--the whole grouped and clustered about three lofty spires, with round arches, well planted upon a Gothic apse, made a magnificent figure against the horizon.

To the right of the Tournelles, that truss of enormous towers, black as ink, running into each other and tied, as it were, by a circular moat; that donjon keep, much more pierced with loopholes than with windows; that drawbridge, always raised; that portcullis, always lowered,--is the Bastille.

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Then the porter raised some difficulties, but the Count of Monte Cristo produced a permit from the governor of Rome, allowing him to leave or enter the city at any hour of the day or night; the portcullis was therefore raised, the porter had a louis for his trouble, and they went on their way.

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"Young man," quoth Sir Nigel, sternly, "if you are of the same way of thought as your brother, you may not pass under portcullis of mine."

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Rolls-Royce workers from the threatened Bootle plant and from other Rolls-Royce sites across the UK will also attend the inquiry at Portcullis House, London.