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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

tunnel.

An underground or underwater passage.

6 characters2 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/ˈtʌn(ə)l/

  1. An underground or underwater passage.

  2. A passage through or under some obstacle.

  3. A hole in the ground made by an animal, a burrow.

  4. A wrapper for a protocol that cannot otherwise be used because it is unsupported, blocked, or insecure.

  5. A vessel with a broad mouth at one end, a pipe or tube at the other, for conveying liquor, fluids, etc., into casks, bottles, or other vessels; a funnel.

  6. The opening of a chimney for the passage of smoke; a flue.

  7. A level passage driven across the measures, or at right angles to veins which it is desired to reach; distinguished from the drift, or gangway, which is led along the vein when reached by the tunnel.

  8. Anything that resembles a tunnel.

    figuratively
Where this word comes from

Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *temh₁-? Proto-Indo-European *tend- Proto-Indo-European *tondeh₂ Proto-Celtic *tondā Gaulishbor.? Medieval Latin tunna Old French tone Proto-Indo-European *-lós Proto-Indo-European *-elós Proto-Italic *-elos Latin -lus Latin -ellus Old French -el Old French tonelbor. Middle English tonnel English tunnel From Middle English tonnel, from Old French tonel(e), diminutive of tone (“cask”), a word of uncertain origin and affiliation. Related to Old English tunne (“tun; cask; barrel”). More at tun.

verb/ˈtʌn(ə)l/

  1. To make a tunnel through or under something; to burrow.

    transitive

  2. To dig a tunnel.

    intransitive

  3. To transmit something through a tunnel (wrapper for an insecure or unsupported protocol).

  4. To insert a catheter into a vein to allow long-term use.

    transitive

  5. To undergo the quantum-mechanical phenomenon where a particle penetrates through a barrier that it classically cannot surmount.

Where this word comes from

Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *temh₁-? Proto-Indo-European *tend- Proto-Indo-European *tondeh₂ Proto-Celtic *tondā Gaulishbor.? Medieval Latin tunna Old French tone Proto-Indo-European *-lós Proto-Indo-European *-elós Proto-Italic *-elos Latin -lus Latin -ellus Old French -el Old French tonelbor. Middle English tonnel English tunnel From Middle English tonnel, from Old French tonel(e), diminutive of tone (“cask”), a word of uncertain origin and affiliation. Related to Old English tunne (“tun; cask; barrel”). More at tun.

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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.