guidestone

English

Etymology

guide +‎ stone

Noun

guidestone (plural guidestones)

1. A traditional stone marker providing directions for travellers.
   • 1980, Arthur Edward Dodd, Evelyn Mary Dodd, Peakland Roads and Trackways, page 108:

     Arrived at Wellington's Monument, the way levels over Eaglestone Flat and passes a guidestone […] that is unusual in being inscribed on one face only: Chesterfeild Roade.

2. (figurative) Something serving as a guide.
   • 1994, Mathematica Japonicae, volume 40, page 18:

     Now, as a guidestone for modernization of the classical theory of meromorphic functions, a new revolution was born with discovery of two main theorems by R. Nevanlinna in 1925.