having an acute or obtuse (or non-right) angle
oblique-angled, obliquangular
anglegreater than 180°
reflex angle
being an angle formed by two planes
dihedral
on a plane or unbroken surface
flat, level, planar, tabular, flattened, even, applanate,
homaloidal
on a slant
slanting, aslant, inclined, oblique, on a bias, diagonal, askew
bent abruptly
geniculate, inflexed, intorted
bent abruptly backward
retroflex, cacuminal
showing short and sharp veelike turns
zigzag, staggered, chevroned, cringle-crangle
If the long sides, given by joining the Station positions, were to be related to the Moon in the same way, the Station positions would need to form not a rectangle, but a parallelogram with corners that were not right angles. Shifting Stonehenge only 50 miles to the north or south would change the required angles by as much as 2°.
FRED HOYLE,
On Stonehenge
He loved how this house welcomed into itself in every season lemony flecked rhomboids of sun whose slow sliding revolved it with the day, like the cabin of a ship on a curving course.
JOHN UPDIKE, Couples
Pointed bastions have been added to the corners of the almost square Roman city. From these it was possible to send an enfilade along the sides of the ramparts. But the bastions, themselves, presented quite a large flank which also could be fired upon. Therefore they must be sharply pointed which technically is a poor form for earthern [sic] structures. It was quickly discovered that the rectangular contour was the least practical for a fortification of ramparts with bastions. A pentagon was better than a rectangle and a hexagon was still better. But best of all would be a town periphery in the form of a polygon.
STEEN RASMUSSEN,
Towns and Buildings
Immediately on passing through Porta del Popolo the visitor enters a square, Piazza del Popolo. Today it is an oval but at that time it was a long, narrow trapezoid converging toward the gateway and with long garden walls on either side. Facing the city, one saw the three thoroughfares thrusting deep into the town. The two triangular building sites form an effective front with two symmetrical domed churches strongly emphasizing the solid mass of the houses advancing toward the open space of the piazza.
STEEN RASMUSSEN ,
Towns and Buildings
having a shape formed by lines rather than by curves (hence having angles
angular
having a curve or curves (roundness or rondure)
curvilinear, curved, curvate, bowed, curviform, arcing,
arciform
slightly curved
curvulate
curved upward
upcurved, upturned, arched, arcuate, vaulted, concamerated
curved downward
downcurved, downturned, decurved, decurvate
curved forward
procurved
curved backward
recurved, recurvate
curved inward
incurved, incurvate, involute, hooked, aduncous
curved outward
excurved, excurvate
curving back toward itself
hooked, crooked
curved around farther than a semicircle
gibbous
curved up and around and closed or almost closed
looped
describing a curve that is bold or lengthy
sweeping
describing a series of reverse curves
whiplash
curving or arcing (two curved lines) to a point
cusped
The thing was not unlike an uncut diamond of the darker sort, though far too large, being almost as big as the top of my thumb. I took it, and saw it had the form of a regular octahedron, with the carved faces peculiar to the most precious of minerals.
H. G. WELLS, “The Diamond Maker”
The body of the machine was small, almost cylindrical, and pointed. Forward and aft on the pointed ends were two small petroleum engines for the screw, and the navigators sat deep in a canoe-like recess, the foremost one steering, and being protected by a low screen with two plate-glass windows, from the blinding rush of air. On either side a monstrous flat framework with a curved front border could be adjusted so as either to lie horizontally or to be tilted upward or down. H . G . WELLS, “The Argonauts of the Air”
I recognised the tortuous, tattered band of the Milky Way, with Vega very bright between sun and earth; and Sirius and Orion shone splendid against the unfathomable blackness in the opposite quarter of the heavens. The Pole Star was overhead, and the Great Bear hung over the circle of the earth. And away beneath and beyond the shining corona of the sun were strange groupings of stars I had never seen in my life—notably, a dagger-shaped group that I knew for the Southern Cross.
H. G. WELLS, “Under the Knife”
curving to a central point with a “dip” (contraflexure) inward on either
side of the apex
ogival
making a perfect closed curve (two dimensions)
circular, round, ring-like, annular, cycloid, cycloidal, rotund
flat and circular
discoid
hollowed inward
concave, bowl-like, basin-like, crater-like, dished, sunken,
depressed
rounded and bulging outward
convex, protuberant, gibbous, cupped, cupriform
concave on one side and convex on the other
concavo-convex,convexo-concave
more
curved on the concave than on the convex side
concavo-convex
more curved on the convex than on the concave side
convexo-concave
concave on two or both sides
biconcave
convex on two or both sides
biconvex, amphicyrtic
circular in three dimensions or ball-like
round, spherical, spheral, globular, globose, orblike, globate,
rotund, spheriform, bombous, conglobate
nearly round
obrotund
like a half-circle
semicircular, hemicyclic
like a half-moon (or lune)
semilunar, demilune
round but wider in the middle or flattened at the top
oblate
... it was the planet Saturn rushing towards me. Larger and larger it grew, swallowing up the heavens behind it, and hiding every moment a fresh multitude of stars. I perceived its flattened, whirling body, its disc-like belt, and seven of its little satellites. It grew and grew, till it towered enormous, and then I plunged amid a streaming multitude of clashing stones and dancing dust-particles and gas-eddies, and saw for a moment the mighty triple belt like three concentric arches of moonlight above me, its shadow black on the boiling tumult below.
H. G. WELLS. “Under the Knife”
The stalagmites of Armand are a rather unusual variety—they appear to be made of rounded, irregular, hollow cones, which are concave upwards.
TONY WALTHAM, Caves
If you draw a small irregular shape on the oblong edge of the pack, every tiny part of that picture will change when you shear the oblong to form a rhomboid. Only the area remains the same; and only the sides, which are straight and parallel, remain straight and parallel. But oceans and continents are not parallelograms! DAVID GREENHOOD,
Mapping
By the time the Iceberg drifts past Cape York the pack-ice is looser and studded with bergs of every size and description.
round but longer vertically (as along a polar axis)
prolate
more or less round
spheroidal, ellipsoidal
egg-shaped
ooid, oval, ovoid, ovaliform, oviform, elliptical, ellipsoidal
ovoid with the wider end up
abovoid
shounng coils or twists
convoluted, convolved, whorled
winding (as if around a pole) in shape
spiral, helical, gyral, heliciform, sirulate, cochleate,
corkscrew, tortile, curlicue
spiral but narrowing toward the bottom
turbinate
having numerous turns or bends
bending, winding, twisting, tortuous, sinuous, serpentine,
meandering, anfractuous, waving, wavy, undulant,
undulating
like a complex or confusing network
maze-like, mazy, labyrinthine, plexiform
having or in the form of connecting links
chain-like, festooned, catenary, catenate, concatenate,
concatenated
enclosing (with either straight or curved lines) a space and constituting a
figure
closed
not (either straight or curved lines) enclosing a space or constituting a
figure
open
The biggest are still the ones from the fiords behind Jakob shavn but there are also many smaller bergs that have crumbled off the ice cliffs in Melville Bay. There are humped and crested bergs, like the backs of dinosaurs; round and ridged ones, like giant scallop shells; tall, turretted squares like castles; tilted blocks which rise to sheer cliffs, like the bows of ocean-liners. There are tent-shaped, conch-shaped, gable-shaped, and fluted bergs. This glittering mass is pushed by the current, stronger now, westward through the thinning pack.
RICHARD BROWN,
Voyage of the Iceberg
On the computer-enhanced images they could see a patchwork of sinuous valleys like those found on Mars. There were also areas of grooved terrain, similar to that found by
Voyager
on the surface of one of Jupiter’s satellites, Gany mede. Elsewhere, the surface of Miranda resembled the cratered highlands of our own Moon, and there were also giant scarps higher than the Grand Canyon. In the centre of the satellite was a large rocky area shaped rather like a chevron, and two multi-ringed features rather like archery targets bracketed it.
ARTHUR SMITH,
Planetary
Exploration
Mounted on the decagon on struts is the high-gain antenna, the all-important dish through which all communications to and from Earth pass. The 3.66 m diameter dish is an aluminium honeycomb structure surfaced on both sides with laminated graphite-epoxy.
ARTHUR SMITH,
Planetary Exploration
It was an almost perfect cone of snow, simple in outline as if a child had drawn it, and impossible to classify as to size, height, or nearness. It was so radiant, so serenely poised, that he wondered for a moment if it were real at all. Then, while he gazed, a tiny puff clouded the edge of the pyramid, giving life to the vision before the faint rumble of the avalanche confirmed it.
JAMES HILTON,
Lost Horizon
making a closed plane figure of straight lines
polygonal
many-sided
multilateral, polygonal
having many angles
multiangular, polyangular
being a two-dimensional figure
plane
being a three-dimensional figure
solid
being a solid figure with many sides
polyhedral, polyhedric
being polyhedral with all vertices in two parallel planes
prismatoidal
many-sided with parallelogram sides and the bases or ends parallel and
congruent
prismatic
prismatic with parallelograms as bases or ends
parallelepipedal
being a parallelepiped with rhombuses for faces
rhombohedral
having two sides
bilateral
having two faces or fronts
bifacial
three-sided
triangular, deltoid, trilateral, wedge-shaped, cuneate,
trigonal, cuneiform, trigonous, deltoid