furnace Meaning, Definition & Usage

  1. noun an enclosed chamber in which heat is produced to heat buildings, destroy refuse, smelt or refine ores, etc.

WordNet

Fur"nace noun
Etymology
OE. fornais, forneis, OF. fornaise, F. fournaise, from L. fornax; akin to furnus oven, and prob. to E. forceps.
Definitions
  1. An inclosed place in which heat is produced by the combustion of fuel, as for reducing ores or melting metals, for warming a house, for baking pottery, etc.; as, an iron furnace; a hot-air furnace; a glass furnace; a boiler furnace, etc. ✍ Furnaces are classified as wind or air. furnaces when the fire is urged only by the natural draught; as blast furnaces, when the fire is urged by the injection artificially of a forcible current of air; and as reverberatory furnaces, when the flame, in passing to the chimney, is thrown down by a low arched roof upon the materials operated upon.
  2. A place or time of punishment, affiction, or great trial; severe experience or discipline. Deut. iv. 20.
Fur"nace noun
Definitions
  1. To throw out, or exhale, as from a furnace; also, to put into a furnace. Obs. or R.
    He furnaces The thick sighe from him. Shak.

Webster 1913