Ellyptical Regency Pedestal Table

Ellipse, Oval or Racetrack and the Tale of a Pedestal Table.

Designing this custom pedestal table has brought up an America vs Britain language difference, which has been hotly debated in our home. To me (a Brit) an egg is a type of oval, symmetrical with a single long axis and a continuously changing curved circumference. The table shown here is elliptical, being symmetrical along two axes, one longer than the other. (Apogee vs. Perigee, but that's altogether another debate.) Then there's the racetrack, which has straight sides and half-round ends. In America, as I understand it, oval is synonymous with racetrack, even though we agree this table is ellyptical.

The Mirriam Webster defines an oval this way:

1: An oval figure or object (Not very helpful). 2: A racetrack in the shape of an oval or a rectangle having rounded corners.

That wasn't satisfactory to me, so I turned to my trusted Concise English Dictionary. Oval is defined as:

1: Egg shaped or ellipsoidal. 2: Closed curve with one axis considerably longer than the other, eg the Surrey cricket ground.

So there you have it, NASCAR vs Cricket. It all comes down to sport, as usual, and the debate continues...

Let's discuss a new handmade dining table, coffee table, or occassional table for your home. As the customer, you can call the shape anything you like!