'Steeple engine' definitions:
Definition of 'Steeple engine'
From: GCIDE
- Steeple \Stee"ple\ (st[=e]"p'l), n. [OE. stepel, AS. st[=e]pel, st[=y]pel; akin to E. steep, a.] (Arch.) A spire; also, the tower and spire taken together; the whole of a structure if the roof is of spire form. See Spire. "A weathercock on a steeple." --Shak. [1913 Webster]
- Rood steeple. See Rood tower, under Rood.
- Steeple bush (Bot.), a low shrub (Spiraea tomentosa) having dense panicles of minute rose-colored flowers; hardhack.
- Steeple chase, a race across country between a number of horsemen, to see which can first reach some distant object, as a church steeple; hence, a race over a prescribed course obstructed by such obstacles as one meets in riding across country, as hedges, walls, etc.
- Steeple chaser, one who rides in a steeple chase; also, a horse trained to run in a steeple chase.
- Steeple engine, a vertical back-acting steam engine having the cylinder beneath the crosshead.
- Steeple house, a church. [Obs.] --Jer. Taylor. [1913 Webster]