barbican

• barbacan

From Old French barbacane, of uncertain origin: compare Arabic بَرْبَخ‎ (barbaḵ, “aqueduct, sewer”), and Persian باب‌خانه‎ (bâb-khâne, “gatehouse”).

• IPA^(key): /ˈbɑː(ɹ)bɪkən/

barbican (plural barbicans)

1. A tower at the entrance to a castle or fortified town
2. A fortress at the end of a bridge.
3. An opening in the wall of a fortress through which the guns are levelled; a narrow loophole through which arrows and other missiles may be shot.
   • 1922 James Joyce, Ulysses 11:

     Two shafts of soft daylight fell across the flagged floor from the high barbacans.

4. A temporary wooden tower built for defensive purposes.

• (entryway fortification): see guardhouse

• bartisan

• Samuel Johnson, Dictionary of the English Language (1766)
• “barbican” in The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd edition, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1989, →ISBN.