gondola

Reading level: hard

Estimated CEFR level: C2 — Proficiency

Estimated from word frequency; not an official CEFR classification.

Definition

noun a low flat-bottomed freight car with fixed sides but no roof
noun long narrow flat-bottomed boat propelled by sculling; traditionally used on canals of Venice
noun the compartment that is suspended from an airship and that carries personnel and the cargo and the power plant

Borrowed from Italian gondola, from Venetan góndoƚa. Possibly from Byzantine Greek κοντοῦρα (kontoûra, “cutter, kind of ship”).

Smith Gondola Days " " Saunterings C.D. — Modern Prose And Poetry; For Secondary Schools: Edited With Notes, Study Helps, And Reading Lists, Unknown
Song, gondolas, light, Floated a-twinkling out into the dusk. — Ecce Homo: Complete Works, Volume Seventeen, Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche
We have been pretty much every where in our gondola. — The Innocents Abroad, Mark Twain

gondola car

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