circus tent
3
2.5
- noun
- /ˈsɜrkəs tɛnt/
:
carpa de circo
- Families gathered under the colorful circus tent to enjoy the thrilling performances of acrobats and clowns.
- a striped circus tent
- walk through a circus tent
- circus tents stood
So what they do, they went and bought circus tents and they put them up in various parking lots.
- So what they do, they went and bought circus tents and they put them up in various parking lots.
- It's as if it were a circus tent with a rope ladder on one end, rope ladder on the other.
Examples
-
So what they do, they went and bought circus tents and they put them up in various parking lots.
-
In the electric aura of the circus tent, 1975, a man was pedaling on a bicycle.
Fiction book (1998) -
See, I spent the night in what I thought was an abandoned circus tent.
-
The circus tent was a wide and lonely place.
Fiction book (1992) -
What's a circus tent doing all the way out here?
-
This had been a circus tent, confiscated from some traveling big top months before.
Fiction book (1992) -
That morning, Leighton and Archer went to the new American Institute of Mines, which was a long banquet table under a circus tent.
Fiction book (1997) -
We resisted, and he stared at us over meals, and then we decided to confront him on his own ground, under the circus tent.
Fiction book (1990) -
We thought of tightrope walkers, bareback riders, and hot circus tents on blue summer days.
Fiction book (1997) -
The buffet, the punch bowl, and the champagne wagons, tended by clowns, were to his right; to the left, through the open flap of the circus tent, lay the garden, now lit by strings of colored lights: red, green, yellow, blue, and he caught a glimpse of a merry-go-round across the lawn.
Fiction book (1992)
Synonyms
58
4.4
A large tent or open-sided building used outdoors for events
23
5.3
A large tent used for circus shows
7
7.1
A large tent used for parties and events
5
3.5
A large tent used for circus shows
1
1.3
A big shelter made of cloth for people at outdoor events
A large tent that holds people for a circus show
How Big
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning 'a large tent used to house circus performances' is directly and predictably derived from combining 'circus' (a travelling show) with 'tent' (a collapsible shelter). This noun+noun compositional pattern is common cross-linguistically and follows straightforward English compounding, so a B1 learner who knows both constituents will readily understand the MWE.
Etymology
Circus tent paints a simple picture: traveling shows put up a huge striped tent to hold the circus performers, animals, and audience, creating a bold, covered space. That's why it means 'a large tent used for circus performances'.