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n. - A drill for cutting circular holes around a center; A surgical instrument used to remove sections of bone from the skull v. - Cut a hole with a special instrument, as in surgery.

Watch out! You may see this word with another pronunciation and its meaning is then different.
Used as a noun, listen here, it means: n. - A drill for cutting circular holes around a center; A surgical instrument used to remove sections of bone from the skull; v. - Cut a hole with a special instrument, as in surgery. Used as a noun, listen here, it means: A heavy tool consisting of vertical chisels fixed to a horizontal bar and used in boring mine shafts.

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Usage examples (36)
  • I think this writer meant to say 'trepan‚ because that's a drill, while a terrapin is an-
  • Relatively humane compared to the older method of using a hammer that would trepan the animal.
  • My interest was purely academic as I examined the small wound that the trepan had left in his scalp.
  • Then comes the larger trepan, with a width of 4.80 mètres, and repeats the process on a larger scale.
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Tutoring comment
  • ''trepan" is a heteronym, which means you may find it with different pronunciations and different meanings.
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