Webster
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Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary · 1913

Cell

Cell, n. [OF. celle, fr. L. cella; akin to celare to hide, and E. hell, helm, conceal. Cf. Hall.] 1. A very small and close apartment, as in a prison or in a monastery or convent; the hut of a hermit.

The heroic confessor in his cell. Macaulay.

2. A small religious house attached to a monastery or convent. "Cells or dependent priories." Milman.

3. Any small cavity, or hollow place.

4. (Arch.) (a) The space between the ribs of a vaulted roof. (b) Same as Cella.

5. (Elec.) A jar of vessel, or a division of a compound vessel, for holding the exciting fluid of a battery.

6. (Biol.) One of the minute elementary structures, of which the greater part of the various tissues and organs of animals and plants are composed.

☞ All cells have their origin in the primary cell from which the organism was developed. In the lowest animal and vegetable forms, one single cell constitutes the complete individual, such being called unicelluter orgamisms. A typical cell is composed of a semifluid mass of protoplasm, more or less granular, generally containing in its center a nucleus which in turn frequently contains one or more nucleoli, the whole being surrounded by a thin membrane, the cell wall. In some cells, as in those of blood, in the amœba, and in embryonic cells (both vegetable and animal), there is no restricting cell wall, while in some of the unicelluliar organisms the nucleus is wholly wanting. See Illust. of Bipolar.

Air cell. See Air cell. — Cell development (called also cell genesis, cell formation, and cytogenesis), the multiplication, of cells by a process of reproduction under the following common forms; segmentation or fission, gemmation or budding, karyokinesis, and endogenous multiplication. See Segmentation, Gemmation, etc. — Cell theory. (Biol.) See Cellular theory, under Cellular.

Cell (sĕl), v. t. [imp. & p. p. Celled (sĕld).] To place or inclose in a cell. "Celled under ground." [R.] Warner.

Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Noah Porter, editor (Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913). Public domain. Text as transcribed by MICRA, Inc., from Project Gutenberg. Changed for Deep Dive Bible: Greek, which our source spelled in Latin letters, set in Greek letters; entries of one spelling merged into one article; Greek words our source left out (shown as “?”), read from the 1898 printing, from the same plates (the Library of Congress’s copy), where the place could be found with certainty. Of the others, 1,362 (a word or a single letter each) were inferred by AI from the context by the dictionary’s own rules and are marked with a wavy underline (tap or point at one to see the note); the rest, which could not be inferred with confidence, are left as “?”.