sentinel means A place in the United States:; An unincorporated community in Maricopa County, Arizona. It carries an Arena rating of 1626, earned across 7 head-to-head judged battles.
Among words judged in Lexicurio's Arena, sentinel ranks #2,405 of 17,116 for Words That Escaped Their Books, #2,605 of 17,115 for Most Vivid Words, #2,753 of 17,130 for Most Ingenious Words, #3,634 of 17,120 for Most Beautiful Words.
sentinel is pronounced /ˈsɛn.tɪ.nəl/.
Why “sentinel” is a great word
A soldier or guard posted to keep watch and prevent surprise attacks. From Middle French sentinelle ("watch or guard kept by a soldier"), from Old Italian sentinella, probably from sentina ("vigilance") + -ella (diminutive suffix), from sentire ("to perceive, watch, hear"), from Latin sentīre ("to feel, perceive by the senses"), first attested in English in the 1570s. Unlike "sentry," which often implies a fixed post, or "watchman," a civilian guardian of property, a sentinel embodies a more solemn and encompassing vigilance, one easily lifted into metaphor. It is the lone pine etched against a twilight ridge, the unblinking gargoyle on a cathedral parapet, the lighthouse beam cutting its patient arc through the fog—any steadfast figure whose mere presence demarcates the fragile boundary between the safe interior and the vast, encroaching unknown.
Etymology
First attested in the 1570s from Middle French sentinelle (“watch or guard kept by a soldier”), from Old Italian sentinella, probably from sentina + -ella, from sentire (“perceive, watch, hear”), from sentiō (“feel, perceive by the senses”). See also sense, sentient.
name
- A place in the United States:; An unincorporated community in Maricopa County, Arizona.
- A place in the United States:; A ghost town in Fresno County, California.
- A place in the United States:; An unincorporated community in Polk County, Missouri.
- A place in the United States:; A town in Washita County, Oklahoma.
noun
- A sentry, watch, or guard.
- A private soldier.e.g.““I will not permit the poorest centinel to be treated with injustice.””
- A unique value recognised by a computer program for processing in a special way, or marking the end of a set of data.e.g.“The <xmp> tag is a sentinel that suspends web-page processing and displays the subsequent text literally”
- A sentinel crab.
- A sign of a health risk (e.g. a disease, an adverse effect).e.g.“sentinel animals can be used to explore endemic diseases.”
verb
- To watch over as a guard.e.g.“He sentineled the north wall.”
- To post a guard for.e.g.“He sentineled the north wall with just one man.”
Words closest in meaning
By meaning, not spelling — each word's AI semantic fingerprint, nearest first.