gullah

The core idea is shape: a rounded, open basin. The same word names three very different objects in the Hebrew Bible, and what ties them together is their curved, bowl-like form:

• the golden bowl of Ecclesiastes 12:6, a rounded vessel whose shattering pictures the end of life
• the reservoir of oil on top of the golden lampstand in Zechariah's vision, feeding the lamps
• the rounded cap crowning each of the two bronze pillars that stood before Solomon's temple

So the word is defined by form rather than by use. When it names the top of a pillar, it points to a specific feature: the rounded swelling at the very top of the column, not the whole ornamented capital. A related vessel word, מִזְרָק, by contrast is defined by what it is for, dashing liquid in worship, rather than by its shape.

In its other sense the word names a source of water. It appears in only one short episode, told twice: Achsah, given a field in the dry southern hill country, asks her father Caleb for water, and he grants her the upper and lower springs. Whether these were natural springs or dug basins that caught runoff is hard to tell from the text, which is why English Bibles move between "springs" and "pools."

The usual word for flowing water rising from the ground is מַעְיָן; this word leans instead toward a rounded basin that gathers and holds water, keeping the same underlying picture of roundness that the bowl sense carries.