Pil·lar n.
 1. The general and popular term for a firm, upright, insulated support for a superstructure; a pier, column, or post; also, a column or shaft not supporting a superstructure, as one erected for a monument or an ornament.
    Jacob set a pillar upon her grave.   --Gen. xxxv. 20.
 The place . . . vast and proud,
 Supported by a hundred pillars stood.   --Dryden.
 2. Figuratively, that which resembles such a pillar in appearance, character, or office; a supporter or mainstay; as, the Pillars of Hercules; a pillar of the state. “You are a well-deserving pillar.”
    By day a cloud, by night a pillar of fire.   --Milton.
 3. R. C. Ch. A portable ornamental column, formerly carried before a cardinal, as emblematic of his support to the church. [Obs.]
 4. Man. The center of the volta, ring, or manege ground, around which a horse turns.
 From pillar to post, hither and thither; to and fro; from one place or predicament to another; backward and forward. [Colloq.]
 Pillar saint. See Stylite.
 Pillars of the fauces. See Fauces, 1.


 Sty·lite n.  Eccl. Hist. One of a sect of anchorites in the early church, who lived on the tops of pillars for the exercise of their patience; -- called also pillarist and pillar saint.
    The two other holy men in Gregory's narrative had more exotic origins than the pair that has just been seen.  Gregory encountered one of them when on a journey to the north-eastern parts of the Frankish kingdom.  This was a Lombard, named Vulfolaic, who had spent some years in the arduous exercise of being a stylite, the Christian equivalent of a flagpole sitter; in other words, Vulfolaic was a monk whose main austerity consisted in living on top of a pillar.  By carrying out this feat in the rain, snow, and frost of the Moselle valley, Vulfolaic had convinced the local population to overthrow and abandon the idol of Diana to which they were addicted.   --Walter Goffart, FOREIGNERS IN THE HISTORIES OF GREGORY OF TOURS (http://www.arts.uwo.ca/florilegium/goffart.html).

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