Babel

5 definitions found

From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]:

  Babel \Ba"bel\, n. [Heb. B[=a]bel, the name of the capital of
     Babylonia; in Genesis associated with the idea of
     "confusion."]
     1. The city and tower in the land of Shinar, where the
        confusion of languages took place.
        [1913 Webster]


  
              Therefore is the name of it called Babel. --Gen. xi.
                                                    9.
        [1913 Webster]
  
     2. Hence: A place or scene of noise and confusion; a confused
        mixture of sounds, as of voices or languages.
        [1913 Webster]
  
              That babel of strange heathen languages. --Hammond.
        [1913 Webster]
  
              The grinding babel of the street.     --R. L.
                                                    Stevenson.
        [1913 Webster]

From WordNet (r) 2.0 [wn]:

  babel
       n 1: a confusion of voices and other sounds
       2: (Genesis 11:1-11) a tower built by Noah's descendants
          (probably in Babylon) who intended it to reach up to
          heaven; God foiled them by confusing their language so
          they could no longer understand one another [syn: {Tower
          of Babel}]

From Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0 [moby-thes]:

  33 Moby Thesaurus words for "Babel":
     Aesopian language, Greek, argot, babble, bedlam, cacophony, cant,
     cipher, clamor, clash, code, confusion of tongues, cryptogram,
     double Dutch, garble, gibberish, gift of tongues, glossolalia,
     gobbledygook, harshness, hell, jangle, jar, jargon, jumble,
     mere noise, noise, pandemonium, racket, scramble, secret language,
     slang, static
  
  

From The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing (27 SEP 03) [foldoc]:

  BABEL
       
          1. A subset of {ALGOL 60}, with many {ALGOL W} extensions.
       
          ["BABEL, A New Programming Language", R.S. Scowen, Natl Phys
          Lab UK, Report CCU7, 1969].
       
          2. Mentioned in The Psychology of Computer Programming,
          G.M. Weinberg, Van Nostrand 1971, p.241.
       
          3. A language based on {higher-order function}s and
          {first-order logic}.
       
          ["Graph-Based Implementation of a Functional Logic Language",
          H. Kuchen et al, Proc ESOP 90, LNCS 432, Springer 1990,
          pp.271-290].
       
          ["Logic Programming with Functions and Predicates: The
          Language BABEL", Moreno-Navarro et al, J Logic Prog 12(3) (Feb
          1992)].
       
          (1994-11-28)
       
       

From Hitchcock's Bible Names Dictionary (late 1800's) [hitchcock]:

  Babel, confusion; mixture