Crown

Crown (Lat. corona) is a root existing in many languages, and signified at first an ornament for the head, such as the poet's "coronals." It was then adopted as a mark of special honour, as the civic and mural crowns of the Romans, and the victor's laurel of the Greeks. Finally, it became one of the special symbols of sovereignty, and heraldry introduced a certain uniformity in its shape, so that its form might show the rank of the wearer. The crown of Queen Victoria is elaborate and highly ornamental; the crowns of Austria, France, and Russia have their distinctive features - that of Austria much resembling a mitre. The word is also much used metaphorically and technically, the martyr's crown, a sorrow's crown of sorrows, the crown of an arch, of the head, of a tooth.