catenary

Its form is that of the catenary curve, the most perfect shape for an arch, and the only one that requires no buttressing from the side.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 27, 2026

Agnoli, who worked as a carpenter prior to entering architecture, used long spans of wood to create massive trusses and spiraling nautilus shapesand formed brick into catenary arches.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 6, 2025

Contractors will replace overhead catenary wires that supply power to the trains.

From Seattle Times ● Nov. 10, 2022

And then there’s also the basic infrastructure: the track, signal systems, electric catenary systems that also are beyond their useful life in many cases.

From Washington Post ● Sep. 9, 2021

I presume that you saw that it was a catenary curve?”

From Astounding Stories of Super-Science, March 1930 by Harry Bates

Power is often still carried on lines that hang in graceful catenaries of various depths from poles that lean left or right randomly but rarely stand straight.

From New York Times ● Nov. 16, 2012

A relief sculpture by Charles Biederman or the prodigious steel catenaries of Othmar H. Ammann's design for the George Washington Bridge?

From Time Magazine Archive

It is true, they will not be exact catenaries, but they will depart very little from it; much less than portions of circles will.

From Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson, Volume 2 by Thomas Jefferson Randolph

Every catenary lying between them has its directrix higher, and every catenary lying beyond them has its directrix lower than that of the two catenaries.

From Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 5, Slice 3 "Capefigue" to "Carneades" by Various

The catenaries which lie beyond the two generate surfaces whose radius of curvature convex towards the axis in the meridian plane is greater than the radius of concave curvature.

From Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 5, Slice 3 "Capefigue" to "Carneades" by Various