A
cylinder (from
Greek κύλινδρος –
kulindros, "roller, tumbler") is one of the most basic
curvilinear geometric shapes, the
surface formed by the points at a fixed distance from a given
straight line, the
axis of the cylinder. The solid enclosed by this surface and by two planes perpendicular to the axis is also called a cylinder. The
surface area and the
volume of a cylinder have been known since deep antiquity.