nacelle

English

WOTD – 24 May 2023

Etymology

PIE word
*néh₂us

The nacelle (sense 1.1) or gondola of the Hindenburg airship.

The nacelle (sense 1.2) of a Boeing 737-400 aircraft housing one of its engines.

The box-shaped nacelle (sense 2.3) of a wind turbine.

The headlamp of a Douglas Dragonfly motorcycle is housed in a nacelle (sense 2.5).

Borrowed from French nacelle (“rowing boat, skiff; gondola (of a hot-air balloon, etc.); structure on an aircraft to house an engine”), Middle French nacelle (“rowing boat, skiff”), from Old French nacele, from Late Latin naucella, nāvicella (“small boat or ship”), from Latin nāvis (“a ship”) (from Proto-Indo-European *néh₂us (“a boat”)) + -ella (diminutive suffix).^[1]

Cognates

• Anglo-Norman naucele, naucle (“small boat”)
• Late Latin nacella (“small boat”)

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation, General American) IPA^(key): /nəˈsɛl/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɛl
• Hyphenation: na‧celle

Noun

nacelle (plural nacelles)

1. (aviation)
   2. The compartment that holds passengers on a dirigible, hot-air balloon, or other aerostat; a gondola.
   4. A separate streamlined enclosure mounted on an aircraft to house, originally, an engine, and now also cargo or crew.
   5. (archaic) The cockpit of an aircraft.
2. (by extension)
   1. A hollow boat-shaped structure.
   2. An enclosure housing machinery or a motor.
   4. (electrical engineering) The part between the rotor and tower of a wind turbine.
   5. (nautical) The submersed providers of buoyancy of a SWATH-hulled boat.
   7. (road transport) A streamlined enclosure on the body or dashboard of a motor vehicle.

Translations

compartment that holds passengers on an aerostat — see gondola

separate streamlined enclosure mounted on an aircraft to house an engine, cargo, or crew

Arabic: باسنة Catalan: naveta (ca) f Dutch: nacelle Esperanto: nacelo Estonian: gondel Finnish: naselli (fi), kotelo (fi) French: nacelle (fr) f German: Korb (de) m Indonesian: nasel (id) Italian: gondola (it) f Japanese: ナセル (naseru) Korean: 나셀 (nasel) Macedonian: го́ндола f (góndola) Norwegian: Bokmål: nacelle Polish: gondola (pl) f Portuguese: nacelle f Romanian: nacelă (ro) f Russian: гондола (ru) f (gondola), мотогондола (ru) f (motogondola) Spanish: góndola (es) f Swedish: gondol (sv) Turkish: nacel Ukrainian: гондола f (hondola) Welsh: nasél m

cockpit of an aircraft — see cockpit

hollow boat-shaped structure

Finnish: laiva (fi) Galician: please add this translation if you can Macedonian: please add this translation if you can

enclosure housing machinery or a motor

Finnish: kotelo (fi) Galician: please add this translation if you can Macedonian: please add this translation if you can

part between the rotor and tower of a wind turbine

Catalan: naveta (ca) f Finnish: roottorikotelo Galician: please add this translation if you can Macedonian: please add this translation if you can Spanish: góndola (es) f

submersed providers of buoyancy of a SWATH-hulled boat

Finnish: naselli (fi) Galician: please add this translation if you can Macedonian: please add this translation if you can

streamlined enclosure on the body or dashboard of a motor vehicle

Finnish: kojelaudan kotelo Galician: please add this translation if you can Macedonian: please add this translation if you can

References

1. “nacelle, n.”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford: Oxford University Press, March 2023; “nacelle, n.”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.

Further reading

• Nacelle (disambiguation) on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

French

Etymology

Inherited from Old French nacele (“small boat”), from Late Latin navicella, diminutive of Latin navis (“boat”). Doublet of navicelle.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /na.sɛl/

Noun

nacelle f (plural nacelles)

1. (literary) skiff
2. gondola (of hot-air balloon etc.)
3. pod (of spacecraft)
4. cradle

Derived terms

• nacelle élévatrice

Related terms

• naval
• navire
• nef

Further reading

• “nacelle”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.