theodolite

From New Latin theodolitus (1571), perhaps containing Ancient Greek θέᾱ (théā, “sight, view”)[1] and Arabic العِضَادَة (al-ʕiḍāda, “astrolabe, alidade”);[2][3] if so, doublet of alidade.

• IPA^(key): /θiːˈɒdəlaɪt/

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theodolite (plural theodolites)

1. A surveying instrument, consisting of a small mounted telescope, used to measure horizontal and vertical angles.
   • c. 1839, T. L. Mitchell, Three Expeditions into the Interior of Eastern Australia‎, volume 2:

     I drew outlines (according to my usual custom) of all the hills on the horizon before us, and took angles on them with the theodolite.

   • 1839, Robert FitzRoy, Phillip Parker King, Narrative of the Surveying Voyages of His Majesty’s Ships Adventure and Beagle, between the Years 1826 and 1836, […], volume II, London: Henry Colburn, […], →OCLC, page 356:

     The height of those mountains was from five to seven thousand feet above our level, by angular measurement with a theodolite.

   • 1895–1897, H[erbert] G[eorge] Wells, “What I Saw of the Destruction of Weybridge and Shepperton”, in The War of the Worlds, London: William Heinemann, published 1898, →OCLC, book I (The Coming of the Martians), page 91:

     It was a lieutenant and a couple of privates of the 8th Hussars, with a stand like a theodolite, which the artilleryman told me was a heliograph.

   • 1918, Henry Adams, The Education of Henry Adams‎:

     Germany, of all countries, was most vitally concerned in it; but even a cave-dweller in La Fayette Square, seeking only a measure of motion since the Crusades, saw before his eyes, in the spring of 1903, a survey of future order or anarchy that would exhaust the power of his telescopes and defy the accuracy of his theodolites.

   • 2018, John Uren, Bill Price, Surveying for Engineers, Bloomsbury, →ISBN, page 79:

     The process of setting up a theodolite is carried out in three stages: centring the theodolite, levelling the theodolite and elimination of parallax.

• cinetheodolite
• theodolitic
• Y theodolite

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