capitol
noun
Simple meaning
Any building or complex of buildings in which a legislature meets.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
kapihtuhlSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ˈkæpɪtəl
This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.
IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.
Definition
Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.
noun
us
Any building or complex of buildings in which a legislature meets.
The government building in Washington where the United States Senate and the House of Representatives meet
The building in Washington, D.C., in which both houses of the Congress of the United States meet.
USwith context or qualifier
The chief building in any state capital in which the state legislature meets.
USwith context or qualifier
A building occupied by a state legislature
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: Any building or complex of buildings in which a legislature meets.
Used this way, capitol is a reasonably familiar word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. It usually sounds natural in a wide range of settings.
- Emotional tone
- Neutral
- Formality
- Neutral
- Intensity
- Not strongly marked
- How common
- Moderately common
- Connotation
- Confusing or complicated
- Usage feel
- Neutral and straightforward
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
More ways to use capitol
- “The new law was debated intensely inside the Capitol building.”
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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.