noun
kiln
kihln
noun
1
A heated chamber or oven used to bake, dry, or harden materials — used for firing pottery, drying grain or timber, or curing tobacco.
"The pots were left in the kiln overnight to harden."
"Freshly cut timber is dried in a kiln before use."
verb
1
To dry or harden something by baking it in a kiln.
"The bricks are kilned at extremely high temperatures."
How to Use Kiln
Learner’s notesIn plain EnglishA special oven for baking or drying things like pottery, bricks, or timber at very high heat.
Common mistake
Many speakers pronounce it "kil" (dropping the "n" sound) — both that and the fully spelled-out pronunciation are accepted.
Common pairings
fire a kiln
kiln-dried wood
pottery kiln
Word Forms
kilned past tense, kilns plural, kilns singular
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The pots were left in the _____ overnight to harden.
Etymology
From Old English cyln, itself borrowed from Latin culina, "kitchen." The modern spelling keeps the old "-ln" ending that most similar words (like "mill") smoothed away over time.