half-comb. form
in comb.
1.
a. With adjectives and pa. pples. Already in Old English: see above. Very common in later use, esp. with pa. pples., to which half- may be prefixed whenever the sense suits: e.g. half-afraid, half-awake, half-blind, half-crazy, half-deaf, half-drunk, half-full, half-human, half-learned, half-mad, half-open, half-raw, half-ripe, half-savage, half-true; half-armed, half-ashamed, half-bent, half-buried, half-cured, half-disposed, half-done, half-dressed, half-eaten, half-educated, half-finished, half-formed, half-hidden, half-opened, half-roasted, half-ruined, etc., etc. With adjs. expressing shape, it implies the form of half the figure, as half-cordate, half-sagittate, half-terete. The two elements are often written separately when the adj. is in the predicate (see half adv. 1); the use of the hyphen mostly implies a feeling of closer unity of notion in the compound attribute, as in half-blind, half-dressed, half-raw, viewed as definite states; but it is often merely for greater syntactical perspicuity, on which ground it is regularly used when the adjective is attributive, thus I am half dead (or half-dead) with cold; a half-dead dog.
(a) in the predicate.
ΚΠ
c893 tr. Orosius Hist. iii. ix. §4 & funde hiene..healf~cucne.
OE Cynewulf Elene 133 Sume healfcwice flugon on fæsten ond feore burgon æfter stanclifum, stede weardedon ymb Danubie. Sume drenc fornamon lagostreame lifes ætende.
c1000 in T. Wright & R. P. Wülcker Anglo-Saxon & Old Eng. Vocab. (1884) I. 163/7 Subalbus, healfhwit.
c1475 in T. Wright & R. P. Wülcker Anglo-Saxon & Old Eng. Vocab. (1884) I. 710/3 Semicecus, halfblynd.
a1626 Bacon Advice to G. Villiers in Wks. (1861) XIII. 53 The officers of the kings houshold..must look both ways, else they are but half-sighted.
1704 Swift Tale of Tub i. 45 As if they were half ashamed to own Us.
1712 Pope Rape of Locke ii, in Misc. Poems 367 Her Eyes half languishing, half drown'd in Tears.
1723 B. Mandeville Ess. Charity in Fable Bees (ed. 2) i. 340 A Rascal Half-drunk.
1725 Pope tr. Homer Odyssey I. iii. 144 Leave half-heard the melancholy tale.
1741 S. Richardson Pamela III. xxi. 124 Being half-vex'd, and half-afraid of his Raillery.
1826 Scott Jrnl. 29 Dec. (1939) 296 Either half educated or cock-brained by nature.
1844 J. R. Lowell Poems 12 A youth half-smiling.
1845 J. Lindley School Bot. (1858) v. 58 Stipules ovate, half-cordate.
1846 ‘A Lady’ Jewish Man. ii. v. 216 Dresses made half high are..unbecoming; they should either be cut close up to the throat or low.
1849 H. D. Thoreau Week Concord & Merrimack Rivers 399 They are half forgotten ere we have learned the language.
1855 C. Kingsley Heroes (1868) ii. iv. 123 Stories of it, some false and some half-true.
1858 W. Bagehot Coll. Wks. (1965) II. 55 Half-crazed as she [Meg Merrilies] is described to be.
1863–5 J. Thomson Sunday at Hampstead v, The meat half-done, they tore it and devoured.
1868 Darwin in Life & Lett. (1887) III. 80 Half-sterile, i.e. produce half the full number of offspring.
1880 A. Gray Struct. Bot. vi. §8. 279 Amphitropous, also termed..Half-anatropous.
1880 Contemp. Rev. Feb. 196, I am more than half-disposed to go along with you in what you say.
1881 ‘M. Twain’ Prince & Pauper 162 He was half-minded to resign.
1893 ‘M. Twain’ Man that corrupted Hadleyburg (1900) 269 The station-master..became pleasant and even half-apologetic.
1904 W. de la Mare Henry Brocken 76, I glanced at the shock-haired creature, alert, half-human, beside me.
1910 J. Morley Cromwell (ed. 2) iii. 54 Never more were fish caught there, and the neighbouring town was half ruined.
1923 D. H. Lawrence Birds, Beasts & Flowers 41 The dim light of full, healthy life That is always half-dark.
1936 Mind 45 252 What were the views concealed or half-concealed, expressed or half-expressed?
1937 Brit. Birds 30 240 We have two records of single adults spending one day in the nest when their young were half-fledged.
1961 M. W. Barley Eng. Farmhouse & Cottage iv. ii. 196 Roofs gabled and half-hipped.
(b) as attribute.
ΚΠ
1593 R. Hooker Of Lawes Eccl. Politie i. viii. 67 Certaine halfwaking men.
a1616 Shakespeare King John (1623) ii. ii. 54 The halfe-blowne Rose. View more context for this quotation
1629 G. Chapman tr. Juvenal Fifth Satyre in Iustification Nero 293 That half-eat hare will fall..to our shares.
a1631 J. Donne Serm. (1954) VII. 59 The halfe-present man, he, whose body is here, and minde away.
1682 N. O. tr. N. Boileau-Despréaux Lutrin ii. 16 And clos'd her speech with an half-dying swoon.
1687 Dryden Hind & Panther iii. 96 The clown unread, and half-read gentleman.
a1711 T. Ken Hymnotheo in Wks. (1721) III. 333 Half-form'd Words.
1726 Pope tr. Homer Odyssey V. xxii. 196 The half-shut door conceal'd his lurking foes.
1772 Hunter in Philos. Trans. (Royal Soc.) 62 453 Half-digested food.
1786 S. Henley tr. W. Beckford Arabian Tale 18 The learned; the half learned; and those who were neither.
1817 S. T. Coleridge Biogr. Lit. 223 In one of his half-earnest, half-joking moods.
1827 R. Southey Hist. Peninsular War II. 679 The half-armed, half-clothed, half-hungered Arragonese.
c1827 J. S. Mill in Adelphi (1924) I. 689 A half-cultivated taste is always caught by gaudy, affected, and meretricious ornament.
1833 J. S. Mill Lett. (1910) i. 41 It looks like the production of some half-fledged pupil of yours.
1837 H. Hallam Introd. Lit. Europe I. viii. 602 Some half-informed critics.
1838 E. Bulwer-Lytton Alice I. i. iii. 22 Her half-childish, half-womanly grief.
1843 J. S. Mill Syst. Logic II. v. ii. 345 It is in those steps of the reasoning which are made in this tacit and half-conscious, or even wholly unconscious manner, that the error oftenest lurks.
1847 M. M. Sherwood Life xii. 220 A little half-coloured child..from India.
1851 H. Melville Moby-Dick xvii. 91 Their half crazy conceits on these subjects.
1851 H. Melville Moby-Dick l. 257 Some sort of a half-hinted influence.
1853–4 J. S. Mill Draft Autobiogr. (1961) 116, I had a half formed intention of writing a History of the French Revolution.
1854 H. D. Thoreau Walden 286 Thus, with half-shut eyes, looking out from the land of dreams.
1858 W. Bagehot Coll. Wks. (1965) II. 72 The undefined, half-expressed..feelings.
1869 D. G. Rossetti Let. 27 June (1965) II. 704 A half-crazed charwoman.
1874 J. Sully Sensation & Intuition 95 Vague and half-thought out recollections.
1877 W. Whitman Specimen Days 104 Some good people may think it a feeble or half-cracked way of spending one's time and thinking.
1887 E. Berdoe St. Bernard's 168 Every half-educated..young man.
1895 W. Robinson Eng. Flower Garden (ed. 4) viii. 118 Shade is not essential, though we think the best effects are attained in half-shady spots.
1897 Essex Antiquarian I. 27 When neither stones nor timber were plenty the half-high wall..was early used, and is still common.
1904 W. H. Hudson Green Mansions xv. 208 Leaving her half-human child to play her malicious pranks in the wood.
1907 Daily Chron. 6 Feb. 4/6 Is he really a half-sexed personage?
1908 Westm. Gaz. 23 Jan. 2/3 Some trivial gossip in the half-lit hall.
1908 Westm. Gaz. 29 July 3/2 The forces of Free Trade may be confidently reckoned on to squash the half-believed-in promises of Tariff Reform.
1910 W. de la Mare Three Mulla-mulgars 120 Her half-blind whitening eyes.
1923 D. H. Lawrence Birds, Beasts & Flowers 37 Wavering men of old Etruria..Going with insidious, half-smiling quietness.
1923 D. H. Lawrence Birds, Beasts & Flowers 41 The half-secret gleam of a passion-flower hanging from the rock.
1925 T. Dreiser Amer. Trag. I. ii. xi. 234 He achieved a..half-apologetic smile.
1927 Daily Tel. 15 Nov. 11/7 Most of the ploughing is done with a pair of horses of the half-legged class.
1929 V. Woolf Room of one's Own 127 Those unsaid or half-said words.
a1930 D. H. Lawrence Last Poems (1932) 307 Invisible Between the half-visible hordes.
1931 W. Ripman Eng. Phonetics 30 Intermediate positions give half-open and half-close vowels.
1932 D. Jones Outl. Eng. Phonetics (ed. 3) viii. 38 Half-close vowels are those in which the tongue occupies a position about one-third of the distance from ‘close’ to ‘open’.
1932 D. Jones Outl. Eng. Phonetics (ed. 3) viii. 38 Half-open vowels are those in which the tongue occupies a position about two-thirds of the distance from ‘close’ to ‘open’.
1934 E. Linklater Magnus Merriman 270 In the country of the blind the half-canned man is king.
1937 Burlington Mag. Nov. 234/2 Such half-forgotten artists.
1937 Mind 46 83 There is a scale of ‘standing-outness’ (Abhebung) which reaches from intense experiential clarity to half-conscious habituation.
1941 Mind 50 10 Some [statements] which would usually be called ‘half-joking’ or ‘not serious’, as when the father says, ‘The wolves are gaining.’
1949 K. S. Woods Rural Crafts Eng. iv. xiii. 200 The delightfully plump and comfortable curves of old Devon roofs are partly due to the ‘hipped’ or ‘half-hipped’ form of the supporting timbers.
1951 W. F. Leopold in S. Saporta & J. R. Bastian Psycholinguistics (1961) 355/1 The half-open fricatives were satisfactory as terminal consonants.
(c) Hence derivatives, as half-dressedness.
ΚΠ
1887 Daily News 29 June 5/4 That delicious condition of half-dressedness.
b. With adverbs, as half-angrily, half-apologetically, half-ashamedly, half-blindly, half-consciously, half-divinely, half-jokingly, half-learnedly, half-questioningly, etc.; half-left, half-right, half-round, etc. Cf. half adv. 1d.
ΚΠ
c1700 I. Watts To Mitio in Horæ Lyricæ Pt. iii. ii, in Wks. (1813) IX. 200 Damon is half-divinely blest.
1807 S. T. Coleridge Notebks. (1962) II. 2998, I still half-consciously expect to awake from the night-mair.
1841 T. Carlyle On Heroes v. 304 Struggling half-blindly, as in bitterness of death, against that!
1863 A. D. T. Whitney Faith Gartney's Girlhood i. 10 Holding the bank-note half-ashamedly in her hand.
1883 Harper's Mag. June 141/2 The..little trot..lisped, half-coaxingly, half-questioningly.
1913 J. London Let. 17 Oct. (1966) 408 He..is..half-apologetically explaining that it is the first time.
1923 J. M. Murry Pencillings 271, I was, half-consciously, anxious to be reassured.
1949 M. Mead Male & Female ii. 22 It is often said half-jokingly.
c.
(a) With verbs, as half-believe, half-deify, half-fill, half-laugh, half-make, half-murder, half-poison. Cf. half adv. 1c.
ΚΠ
1674 A. Wood Life & Times (1892) II. 281 Men that half-hanged themselves to try how it was.
1730 J. Thomson Summer in Seasons 112 Locks That half-embrac'd them in a humid veil.
1823 J. Badcock Domest. Amusem. 60 Half-filling a bottle with water.
1834 H. Martineau Farrers of Budge-Row ii. 25 Two out of the remaining four halfstarted from their chair.
1848 Thackeray Vanity Fair xlv. 405 He half-murdered a ferret.
1849 H. D. Thoreau Week Concord & Merrimack Rivers 192, I half believed that I should get above it.
a1850 M. Fuller Jrnl. in Woman in 19th Cent. (1855) iii. 343 Madame Recamier is half-reclining on a sofa.
1860 E. B. Pusey Minor Prophets 60 The mind which before was..half-deified.
1878 J. N. Lockyer Stargazing 125 We shall not only halve, but half-halve, or quarter the aberration.
1879 J. A. Froude Cæsar xxvii. 477 In Cicero Nature half-made a great man.
1924 J. M. Murry Voy. viii. 152 ‘I can't help it,’ she said, half-laughing at her own confession.
1952 C. P. Blacker Eugenics: Galton & After 293 The problem family is half-believed to be the product of the capitalistic system.
(b)
half-inch v. Rhyming slang to ‘pinch’, to steal.
ΚΠ
1925 E. Fraser & J. Gibbons Soldier & Sailor Words 114 Half-inch, to steal.
a1935 T. E. Lawrence Mint (1955) ii. xi. 130 Half-inching is venial, in certain lines of goods.
1948 W. Clewes Journey into Spring ii. 30 We can half-inch those [eggs] from the huts.
1972 Times 24 Aug. 12/1 If people are going to go around half-inching planets the situation is pretty serious.
half-inching n.
half-lap v. [lap n.3 2b] to make a half-lap joint.
ΚΠ
1825 ‘J. Nicholson’ Operative Mechanic 653 The reason for making the joints half-lapped, or scarfed, [etc.].
1844 H. Stephens Bk. of Farm II. 296 They are half-lapped in pairs at the centre.
d. † half-shaved adj. Obs. U.S. slang drunk.
half-cut adj. slang half-drunk.
ΚΠ
1893 J. S. Farmer & W. E. Henley Slang III. 250/1 Half-cut, half-drunk.
1971 Radio Times 18 Nov. 80 Inebriation..is the sport of all ranks. How many executives can work reasonably effectively unless they are half-cut?
Categories »
half-equitant adj. Bot. = obvolute adj.: cf. demi-equitant n. at demi- prefix 13b.
half-high adj. (see quot.).
ΚΠ
1891 Daily News 18 Nov. 3/1 An evening dress to be worn by a very young girl is made ‘half-high’..which means that the bodice is to be cut away to a line mid~way between the neck and bust.
half-imperial adj. half imperial-folio size.
ΚΠ
1893 W. G. Collingwood Life & Work J. Ruskin I. 92 Ruskin made sketch after sketch on the half~imperial board.
1896 Daily News 23 Oct. 6/5 He generally completed a half-imperial sketch..in two hours.
half-large adj. designating a card of dimensions 3 × 2¼ inches (Jacobi Printer's Vocab.).
half-saved adj. dial. half-witted.
ΚΠ
1834 R. Southey Doctor I. 115 He was what is called half-saved. Some of his faculties were more than ordinarily acute, but the power of self-conduct was entirely wanting in him.
1871 M. Collins Marquis & Merchant I. iii. 100 He was what the villagers called ‘half-saved’; not absolutely imbecile.
ΚΠ
1818 M. L. Weems Let. in Ford's M. L. Weems: Wks. & Ways (1929) III. 225 One night, getting half shaved, he was easily over-persuaded (a common curse of whiskey) to try his luck at All Fours.
a1852 F. M. Whitcher Widow Bedott Papers (1856) xxviii. 354 I've seen that man half shaved on cider afore breakfast in the mornin'.
2. In attributive relation to a noun. Of these there were already a few instances in Old English (e.g. healfmann ‘semivir’, healfpenig, healftrendel hemisphere); their number has been enormously increased in later times, especially through the practice of hyphening an adjective and substantive when these have a special or individualized application. These combinations may be distributed among the following classes: In attributive relation to a n.
a. In the names of Coins, Weights, Measures of space, quantity, time, etc. Cf. demi- prefix 7. Also half-angel n., half-crown n., half-dollar n., half-hour n., half-minute n., etc.These forms may also be used attrib. as in half-inch board, half-mile race, half-quartern loaf, etc.
half-barrel n.
ΚΠ
1494 Act 11 Hen. VII c. 23 Preamb., Every barell, half barrel and firkyn.
half-bit n.
ΚΠ
c1782 T. Jefferson Autobiogr. in Wks. (1859) I. App. 173 The smallest coin..is the half-bit, or 1-20 of a dollar.
half-bottle n.
ΚΠ
1877 E. S. Dallas Kettner's Bk. of Table 287 Where are these bottles and half-bottles of Madeira to be found?
1927 E. Hemingway Men without Women (1928) 172 The American lady bought..a half bottle of Evian water.
1950 T. S. Eliot Cocktail Party i. ii. 51, I found some champagne—Only a half-bottle, to be sure.
half-caser n. [caser n.2]
ΚΠ
1907 H. Lawson in Austral. Short Stories (1951) 70 Felt under his pillow for two half-crowns. ‘Here,’ he said, ‘here's two half-casers.’
half-cent n.
ΚΠ
a1824 R. Patterson cited in Worcester 1846 for Half-cent.
1889 Cent. Dict. Half-cent, a copper coin of the United States..weighing 94 grains, current from 1793 to 1857.
half-cooper n.
ΚΠ
1836 W. H. Maxwell Capt. Blake II. i, Carrying off diurnally his half-cooper of port.
half-farthing n.
ΚΠ
1858 P. L. Simmonds Dict. Trade Products Half-farthing, a British copper coin..the number..issued between 1852 and 1854 was 2,621,784.
half-firkin n.
half-florin n.
half-foot n.
half-hogshead n.
ΚΠ
1707 London Gaz. No. 4337/4 40 half Hogsheads, of true neat Bordeaux Brandy.
half-inch n.
ΚΠ
1820 W. Scoresby Acct. Arctic Regions II. 194 Defended by plates of half-inch iron.
1858 W. Greener Gunnery in 1858 53 An half-inch boiler plate.
half-joe n.
ΚΠ
1777 J. Q. Adams Wks. (1854) IX. 470 Guineas, half joes, and milled dollars in as high estimation as in Pennsylvania.
half-litre n.
ΚΠ
1921 W. J. Locke Mountebank i. 7 A thick half-litre glass of beer.
1967 ‘G. Carr’ Lewker in Tirol iv. 56 He..ordered a half-litre of wine.
half-mile n.
ΚΠ
1603 R. Johnson tr. G. Botero Hist. Descr. Worlde 86 Distant from the towne some halfe mile.
1898 N.E.D. at Half-, Mod. The winner of the half-mile race in the Oxford University Sports.
half-mutchkin n.
ΚΠ
1816 Scott Antiquary I. i. 5 He might have staid to take a half-mutchkin extraordinary with his crony the hostler.
half-peck n.
ΚΠ
1753 Scots Mag. June 310/1 Each.. received a half-peck loaf.
half-pint n. (also ellipt.: a half-pint of beer). (See also sense 2o.)
ΚΠ
1611 R. Cotgrave Dict. French & Eng. Tongues Demi-sextier, the quarter of a French pinte, and much about our halfe pinte.
1611 J. Donne in T. Coryate Crudities sig. d3v, Can all carouse vp thee? No: thou must fit Measures; and fill out for the half-pinte wit.
1727 E. Smith Compl. Housewife 155 Pour it into half pint Basons.
1744 G. Berkeley Let. 21 Aug. in Wks. (1871) IV. 299 Either in half-pint or quarter-pint glasses.
1805 Med. & Physical Jrnl. 14 186 An old half-pint bottle.
1899 R. Whiteing No. 5 John St. xi. 107, I..fell upon roast pork..and a foaming half-pint.
1937 Discovery Sept. 277/1 Fill a half-pint mug.
1966 ‘E. McGirr’ Funeral was in Spain 101 The barman..was morosely polishing half-pint glasses.
half-pipe n.
half-pound n.
ΚΠ
1552 R. Huloet Abcedarium Anglico Latinum Halfe pounde, selibra. Halfe pownde wayght, semissis.
half-quarter n.
ΚΠ
1535 Bible (Coverdale) Neh. iii. 16 The ruler of the halfe quarter of Bethzur.
1685 London Gaz. No. 2078/4 Lace, three half quarters broad.
1884 F. J. Britten Watch & Clockmakers' Handbk. (new ed.) 224 Half-quarter repeaters, instead of giving the minutes, strike one additional blow if the half-quarter has passed.
1898 N.E.D. at Half-, Mod. Alm. 8 Feb., Half-Quarter Day.
half-quartern n.
ΚΠ
1838 Dickens Oliver Twist I. v. 86 A half-quartern loaf and a piece of cheese.
half-tierce n.
ΚΠ
1708 P. A. Motteux Wks. F. Rabelais (1737) v. xlv. 191 A Half-Tierce, or Hogshead.
b. In Heraldry = demi- prefix 1, as half-belt, half-cheek-bit, half-spade, half-spear.
ΚΠ
1688 R. Holme Acad. Armory iii. vii. 44 He beareth Gules, an Horse Bit, Argent. Some do call it..an Half Cheek-Bit.
1688 R. Holme Acad. Armory iii. viii. 5 He beareth Vert, an Half Spade.
1828 W. Berry Encycl. Her. at Spade, This..spade is borne in the arms of Swettenham, but they appear as half-spades.
1889 C. N. Elvin Dict. Heraldry Half-belt and four buckles.
c. In Gunnery and Weaponry, designating a piece of half the size of the full-sized piece, or a shortened size of the latter. Cf. demi- prefix 2 – 4. Also half-pike n., half-sword n., etc.
half-armour n.
ΚΠ
1869 C. Boutell tr. J. P. Lacombe Arms & Armour x. 188 Half-Armour. The period of the partial use of armour, extending to the commencement of the 18th century.
half-cannon n.
ΚΠ
1640 T. Fuller Joseph's Coat 77 Sometimes hee shooteth halfe canon.
1676 London Gaz. No. 1116/3 A Battery of 12 Half-Cannon.
Categories »
half-culverin n.
Categories »
half-falconet n.
half-head-piece n.
ΚΠ
1611 J. Florio Queen Anna's New World of Words Mezza testa, a kind of halfe skull, or halfe head-peece.
half-lance n.
ΚΠ
1868 J. F. Kirk Hist. Charles the Bold III. v. i. 332 Armed with a half-lance.
d.
(a) In Military tactics, dress, etc., as half-squadron, half-turn, half-wheel; Cf. demi- prefix 6. Also half-face n., etc.
ΚΠ
1832 Proposed Regulations Cavalry iii. 73 The..troops wheel half right.
1832 Proposed Regulations Cavalry iii. 99 The Base Troop wheels more than a ‘half-wheel’.
1832 Proposed Regulations Cavalry iii. 103 The Troops wheel half-left.
1859 F. A. Griffiths Artillerist's Man. (1862) 11 Right half turn. Front turn.
(b)
half-battery n.
ΚΠ
1859 F. A. Griffiths Artillerist's Man. (1862) 134 Three subdivisions constitute a half-battery.
half-company n. (see quot. 1853).
ΚΠ
1853 J. H. Stocqueler Mil. Encycl. 128/1 Half-companies are the same as subdivisions, equal to two stations.
half-distance n. (see quots.).
ΚΠ
1853 J. H. Stocqueler Mil. Encycl. 128/1 Half-distance is the regular interval or space between troops drawn up in ranks, or standing in column.
1859 F. A. Griffiths Artillerist's Man. (1862) 30 A battalion in open, or half-distance Column.
half-file n. (see quot. 1853).
ΚΠ
1853 J. H. Stocqueler Mil. Encycl. 128/1 Half-files is half the given number of any body of men drawn up two deep.
half-mounting n. the underclothing and minor articles of apparel belonging to a soldier's outfit in the 18th cent.
ΚΠ
1800 War Office Order 9 Apr. in Grose Milit. Antiq. (1801) II. 186 In lieu of the former articles of cloathing, called half-mounting, two pair of good shoes of the value of five shillings and sixpence each pair.
e. In Fortification. Also half-circle n., half-moon n.
Categories »
half-bastion n.
Categories »
half-caponier n. (Sir G. Duckett, Mil. Dict.)
half-sap n. see demi-bastion n., etc.
ΚΠ
1710 London Gaz. No. 4721/1 We shall be obliged to finish it by the half Sap.
Categories »
half-merlon n. that solid portion of a parapet which is at the right or left extremity of a battery.
f. Naut. and Shipbuilding. Also half-timber n. and adj. † half-wind n. Obs. a side-wind.
half-beam n. (see quot. 1850).
ΚΠ
1845 Encycl. Metrop. VI. 415 The half-beams are all to be of fir.
1850 J. Greenwood Sailor's Sea-bk. 95 Half-Beams are short beams introduced to support the deck where there is no framing.
half-board n. an evolution by which a sailing vessel is luffed up into the wind with everything shaking, and then, before she has quite lost way, permitted to fall off on the same tack: see board n. 15.
ΚΠ
1863 S. B. Luce Seamanship (ed. 2) 484 In a tideway the half-board is of great use.
half-breadth n. (see quot. 1769).
ΚΠ
1769 W. Falconer Universal Dict. Marine at Architecture, The breadth of the ship at every top-timber is limited by an horizontal line drawn on the floor-plane, called the half-breadth of the top-timbers.
Categories »
half-breadth staff n. a rod having marked upon it half the length of each beam in the ship (E. H. Knight Pract. Dict. Mech. 1875).
half-floor n.
ΚΠ
c1860 H. Stuart Novices or Young Seaman's Catech. (rev. ed.) 66 The ‘half-floors’..are pieces of timber placed between the ‘cross pieces’, to which they are ‘coaked’ and bolted.
half-point n.
ΚΠ
1867 W. H. Smyth & E. Belcher Sailor's Word-bk. Half-point, a subdivision of the compass card, equal to 5° 37′ of the circle.
half-port n.
ΚΠ
1850 J. Greenwood Sailor's Sea-bk. 122 Half-ports, a sort of shutters made of deal, and fitted to the stops of those ports which have no hanging lids.
half-top n.
ΚΠ
c1860 H. Stuart Novices or Young Seaman's Catech. (rev. ed.) 76 The half-tops are bolted to the cross trees, and the sleepers are bolted above the trussle trees.
half-watch tackle n. (see quot. 1859).
ΚΠ
1859 F. A. Griffiths Artillerist's Man. (1862) 317 A luff tackle, orhalf watch tackle, consists of one double and one single block: the fall is fixed to the single.
ΚΠ
1611 R. Cotgrave Dict. French & Eng. Tongues Demivent, a side-winde, or halfe-winde.
g. In Music. Cf. demi- prefix 9. Also half-note n., half-tone n.
half-cadence n.
ΚΠ
1876 J. Stainer & W. A. Barrett Dict. Musical Terms 66/2 If the last chord is the dominant and is preceded by the chord of the tonic, the cadence is called half or imperfect.
half-close n. an imperfect cadence.
ΚΠ
1867 G. A. Macfarren Harmony i. 29 A half close is when a passage ends upon the chord of the dominant, regardless of what harmony may precede it.
half-demisemiquaver n.
ΚΠ
1881 Academy 6 Nov. 355 The half demisemiquaver is still much used.
Categories »
half-rest n. U.S. a minim rest.
half-shift n.
ΚΠ
1876 J. Stainer & W. A. Barrett Dict. Musical Terms 216/2 Half-shift, a position of the hand in playing instruments of the violin family. It lies between the open position and the first shift.
half-stop n. (see quots.).
ΚΠ
1880 C. A. Edwards Organs ii. xx. 146 A stop is a set of pipes that run in order from the one end to the other of the clavier. If this set..discontinues at any portion of the keyboard, it is said to be a half stop.
1880 C. A. Edwards Organs ii. xx. 146 Half Stops, properly so called, have practically gone out of fashion.
h. Applied to a stuff which is half of inferior material.
half-gauze n.
ΚΠ
1760 R. Symmer in Philos. Trans. 1759 (Royal Soc.) 51 360 The sort I fixed upon, is what is called half gauze.
half-silk n.
ΚΠ
1738 Swift Compl. Coll. Genteel Conversat. 66 Ladies, you are mistaken in the Stuff; 'tis half Silk.
1796 J. Morse Amer. Universal Geogr. (new ed.) II. 217 No fewer than 443 silk-looms, 149 of half-silks.
half-worsted n.
ΚΠ
1594 T. Blundeville Exercises v. iii. f. 250v, Worsteds, and halfe Worsteds.
half-yarn n.
i. In Games and Sport.
half-marathon n.
ΚΠ
1977 Washington Post 7 Mar. d7/2 Dan Rincon of Delaware Track Club led a field of 297 to win the Athletic Shoe Box Classic half-marathon yesterday.
1985 Oxf. Mail 2 Mar. 1/5 He had already completed a half marathon at Stratford and was..hoping to go for a full marathon.
j. Also half-bowl n.
half-back n. (Association Football) a position immediately behind the ‘forwards’; a player in this position; also in other games, e.g. American Football, Rugby Football, Australian Rules.
ΚΠ
1882 Standard 20 Nov. 2/8 The half-backs..effectually checked the threatened danger.
1887 M. Shearman Athletics & Football (Badm. Libr.) 346 A good half-back must be a versatile player.
1887 Cent. Mag. Oct. 892 Behind the quarter-back, and covering the two sides of the field, are the ‘half~backs’, the cavalry of the team.
1906 D. Gallaher & W. J. Stead Compl. Rugby Footballer v. 71 The half back as we know him in New Zealand is the donkey man of the team.
1959 N. Mailer Advts. for Myself (1961) 53 He paused, crouched into a halfback's position, waiting for the ball.
1965 Sun-Herald (Sydney) 4 July 51 Sydney's half-back flanker Bob Sterling won the President's trophy.
1965 Advertiser (Adelaide) 17 July 25 Its half-forward line..was over-run by the powerful South Adelaide half-back line.
1968 R. D. Eagleson & I. McKie Terminol. Austral. Nat. Football ii. 14 There are three half-backs in each team: left, centre, and right half-back.
1969 Australian 24 May 39/2 Ian Bremner, Norm Bussell and Peter Chilton constitute a tight-checking half-back line for Hawthorn.
half-ball n. Billiards (see quot. 1850).
ΚΠ
1850 H. G. Bohn et al. Hand-bk. Games 524 A half ball, or a contact in which the half of one ball is covered by half of the other, produces in each an equal motion, both with regard to direction, strength, and velocity.
half-blast n. Golf a shot which is played with half the force of a ‘blast’ (explosive shot).
ΚΠ
1928 Weekly Dispatch 24 June 21/6 He played a superb ‘half-blast’ out of a trap to lay the ball one foot from the cup.
half-blue n. the ‘colours’ (see blue n. 15) awarded to a player chosen to represent his university in inter-university contests as second choice to a ‘full blue’, or to any chosen representative in sports or games not recognized by the Blues Committee as sufficiently important for the award of a ‘full blue’; also, a competitor who has gained this award.
ΚΠ
1908 Westm. Gaz. 29 July 10/4 The half-blue for billiards.
1909 Westm. Gaz. 26 Feb. 12/2 For some time players of lacrosse at Oxford have been urging the Blues Committee to grant them the Half-Blue.
1963 Times 5 Feb. 3/3 J. S. Grinalds (Brasenose), an old half-Blue, came back into the defence for the first time this season.
half-brassy shot n. Golf a brassy shot played with a half swing.
ΚΠ
1903 Westm. Gaz. 28 Aug. 3/1 The half-brassy shot approach.
half-captain n. (in women's colleges in Oxford) one who has attained a certain degree of proficiency in the management of a boat.
ΚΠ
1928 Daily Express 7 May 5/2 She may not go on the river unless she is accompanied by a half-captain or is one herself. Half-captaincies may be had either in rowing, canoeing, or punting.
half-captaincy n.
half-colour n. a badge showing that a stage of proficiency half-way towards getting one's colours has been reached (see colour n.1 19b(a)).
ΚΠ
1929 Evening News 18 Nov. 13/5 The player who appears in future bowls international trial matches, but who fails to be selected for the English team, is to receive a ‘half-colour’.
half-court n. Tennis and Rackets half the court divided by a line (the half-court line) parallel with the side lines.
ΚΠ
1888 Encycl. Brit. XXIII. 182/2 A space bounded by the net, the side line, the half-court line, and the service line.
1895 H. W. W. Wilberforce Lawn Tennis 62 The half-court-line dividing the space on each side of the net into two equal parts, called the right and left courts.
1898 Earl of Suffolk et al. Encycl. Sport II. 462/2 The half court nearest the dedans is called the ‘service side’.
1898 Earl of Suffolk et al. Encycl. Sport II. 462/2 The half-court line..dividing the court lengthways into practically two equal parts.
1961 Times 13 Jan. 16/3 Half-court drive down the wall.
half-fifteen n.
half-forty n. Real Tennis (see quot.).
ΚΠ
1888 Encycl. Brit. XXIII. 182/2 Half-fifteen is one stroke given at the beginning of the second and every subsequent alternate game of a set... Half-thirty is one stroke given at the beginning of the first game, two strokes at the beginning of the second game; and so on, alternately, in all the subsequent games of a set... Half-forty is two strokes given at the beginning of the first game, three strokes at the beginning of the second game; and so on, alternately, in all the subsequent games of a set.
half-forward n.
ΚΠ
1968 R. D. Eagleson & I. McKie Terminol. Austral. Nat. Football ii. 14 Half-forward, a player occupying a half-forward position, which comes between the centre and full-forward positions.
half-forward flanker n. Austral. (see quot. 1968); so half-forward flank.
ΚΠ
1963 Courier-Mail (Brisbane) 21 Nov. 7/5 A typical commentary from Australian Rules, ‘a long drop-kick from the half-forward flank’.
1968 R. D. Eagleson & I. McKie Terminol. Austral. Nat. Football ii. 14 Half-forwards in the side position are generally referred to as half-forward flankers.
1969 Australian 24 May 39/2 Bremner will probably be given the task of watching Geelong's mercurial Ken Newland, who will start on a half-forward flank.
half-hit n. Cricket a faulty hit, the ball falling short of the distance it would have travelled if properly hit.
ΚΠ
1888 Daily News 15 Sept. 3/5 Caught at extra mid-off from a half-hit.
1888 A. G. Steel in A. G. Steel & R. H. Lyttelton Cricket iii. 112 Extra cover~point..may be..placed for half-hits wide on the on—i.e. about half the distance from the batsman that a deep field would stand.
1899 W. Caffyn Seventy-one not Out 18 Fielder placed [behind the bowler] for half-hit.
1900 W. A. Bettesworth Walkers of Southgate 41 Mr. R. D. Walker, who was fielding in a nondescript sort of place for a half hit, brought off a brilliant catch.
1928 Daily Tel. 17 July 17/5 Freeman..had two half-hit fieldsmen.
half-iron shot n. Golf an iron shot played with a half swing.
ΚΠ
1895 H. G. Hutchinson Golf (ed. 5) iv. 143 The attitude..for the half-iron stroke.
1905 Westm. Gaz. 10 Nov. 4/2 The half-iron shot..cannot be played properly unless turf is taken.
half nelson n. Wrestling a hold in which one arm is thrust under the corresponding arm of the opponent and the hand placed on the back of his neck; also fig. in phr. to get a half-nelson on: to hold in a crippling position, gain a complete hold over; hence as v. trans. with the sense of this phr.
ΚΠ
1889 W. Armstrong Wrestling 230 Half Nelson, Lancashire.
1896 G. Ade Artie xvii. 154 This thing got the half-Nelson on me before I know it.
1898 Earl of Suffolk et al. Encycl. Sport II. 548/2 The half Nelson and heave.
1901 Black & White Budget 30 Nov. 315/1 The half-nelson... You grasp your opponent by the right wrist with your left hand, thrust your right hand quickly under his arm at the same time seizing his neck and pressing his head forward.
1903 P. Longhurst Wrestling 77 The arm that has the half-nelson hold.
1912 Daily Chron. 6 Mar. And Radicals in sunshine bask with Delight to see the clever Asquith Half-Nelson Bonar Law.
1961 Observer 26 Nov. 27/1 He gives an exquisite demonstration of the half~nelson generally used to make the unwilling talk.
1966 New Statesman 15 July 74/2 He knew..that Sir Alec Douglas-Home had to be..half-nelsoned and regularly thrown out of the ring.
half-one n. Golf (see quot.).
ΚΠ
1887 in J. L. Stewart Golfiana Miscellanea 299 Half-one, a handicap of a stroke deducted every second hole.
half-pin n. Chess that position in which a defending man lies between an attacking piece and the defended king and in the line of attack of the attacking piece, but has liberty to move along the line of attack; (also) that position in which two defending men lie between the attacking piece and the king so that if either moves the other man becomes pinned.
ΚΠ
1922 G. Hume & A. C. White Good Compan. Two-mover 245 The term ‘half-pin’ arose in 1915, in correspondence between Comins Mansfield and Murray Marble anent No. 122 D, a surprising example, with six half-pins... Greenwood, the composer of this problem, had published a complete half-pinner in 1859.
1926 G. Hume & A. C. White Weenink's Chess Probl. 71 By a Half-pin is understood an arrangement where two Black pieces stand in line in such a way that if either one moves the other becomes pinned by a White piece which has been standing behind both of them waiting to exert its pinning powers.
1928 Observer 24 June 25 These three variations are highly complex, the first two illustrating the unpin of the White Q by half-pinned Black Kt's; the third is a half-pin line combined with Black interference.
half-pinned adj.
half-pinner n. a half-pin problem.
half-shot n. Golf a stroke made with a half swing, intended to carry less far than the full shot.
ΚΠ
1891 H. G. Hutchinson Golf 26 The principle of the cutting stroke, on the other hand, lies in bringing the head of the iron across that line. It may be applied to a full shot, half shot, quarter shot or shortest wrist shot.
1893 H. G. Hutchinson Golfing 41 When the distance is less than that for which the three-quarter stroke is used, it is commonly called a half-shot distance.
half-stroke n. Golf = half-one n.
ΚΠ
1896 W. Park Game of Golf v. 107 Three-quarter and half strokes are..much more difficult to play than full shots.
1897 Earl of Suffolk et al. Encycl. Sport I. 461 A half~stroke or over, both in singles and foursomes, shall count as one.
half swing n. Golf a swing of half the usual amount of distance.
ΚΠ
1891 H. G. Hutchinson Golf 30 Take pains in all half-swing shots to bring the club-head well and slowly away from the ball before striking.
Categories »
half-thirty n. Real Tennis (see quot. s.v. half-fifteen n.).
half-topped adj. Golf designating a shot in which the ball is partly topped.
ΚΠ
1896 W. Park Game of Golf ii. 39 A club lying on its heel would, in playing through the green, be apt to get away a half-topped ball.
1896 W. Park Game of Golf x. 204 Hazards..should be placed at such distances from the teeing-grounds that, while a well-hit shot will carry them, a topped or half-topped stroke will get in.
1905 Westm. Gaz. 23 Aug. 5/1 A lucky half-topped shot.
1953 H. Simmons Golfers' ABC The chip shot not as ought to be, The half-topped seven, scuttled three.
half-volley n. (a) Cricket, Football, etc. a ball which pitches so that it can be hit or kicked as soon as it rises from the ground; (hence also) Cricket a ball which pitches just in front of a fieldsman; (b) Lawn Tennis a stroke made when the ball has just left the ground; so half-volleyer; half-volleying vbl. n.; also half-volley vb.
ΚΠ
1843 ‘Wykhamist’ Pract. Hints Cricket 12 All balls pitching between the first line and the crease..are technically termed half vollies.
1843 ‘Wykhamist’ Pract. Hints Cricket 17 A leg half-volley..may be..‘dropped into’ now and then.
1851 J. Pycroft Cricket Field viii. 168 Every one knows the difficulty of making a good half-volley hit off a slow ball.
1851 J. Pycroft Cricket Field x. 189 If a bowler has half volleys returned to him, by stretching and stooping after them, he gets out of his swing.
1867 G. H. Selkirk Guide to Cricket Ground v. 83 The half volley..requires practice to ensure its being picked up properly.
1870 London Society Nov. 425/1 The mode of playing a ball so well known at tennis, not quite half~volley.
1875 ‘Stonehenge’ Man. Brit. Rural Sports (ed. 12) iii. i. v. §4. 691 Half-volleying consists in playing the ball when close to the ground, immediately after it has been dropped.
c1880 A correspondent says : A half-volley at cricket is a ball bowled up so as to pitch just about the point at which the batsman has a good reach.
1891 W. G. Grace Cricket viii. 233 Occasionally you may get a half-volley on the pads.
1897 Earl of Suffolk et al. Encycl. Sport I. 621/2 Half-volley, a stroke made the moment the ball leaves the ground.
1912 Daily News 11 July 2 A famous half-volleyer.
1960 Times 21 June 16/1 Taylor half-volleyed a return into the net.
1963 A. Ross Australia 63 iii. 76 He played at nothing he did not have to, leaving Davidson to flash the odd half-volley through the covers.
1969 New Yorker 14 June 45/1 Players call it a half-volley drop shot. Ashe reaches down, lightly touches the rising ball, and sends it on a slow, sharply angled flight toward the net.
1969 New Yorker 14 June 45/3 Ashe, moving up, is again confronted with the need to half-volley.
k. In Bookbinding, ‘half’ signifies that only the back and corners of the binding consist of the material specified; e.g. half-calf, half-russia.
ΚΠ
1844 Catal. Messrs. C. Knight & Co. 8 Half Morocco or Russia.
1872 O. W. Holmes Poet at Breakfast-table (1885) viii. 192 None of your ‘half-calf’ economies in that volume!
1898 N.E.D. at Half-, Mod. Bookseller's Catal., Original half sheep.
l. In names of animals, as half-ape n., half-ass n., half-snipe n., etc.
m. Applied to various articles and structures of about half the usual or full size or length. Cf. demi- prefix 11. Also half-boot n., etc. † half-head bedstead n. Obs. † half-kirtle n. Obs.
half-bath n.
ΚΠ
1879 A. von Harlingen in A. H. Buck Treat. Hygiene & Public Health I. 373 The half-bath, in which the bather sits in a tub filled with water to the depth of from ten to twelve inches,..is adapted to invalids.
1953 R. Chandler Long Good-bye xxvii. 171 There was a half-bath off the study.
half-bathroom n.
ΚΠ
1959 News Chron. 19 June 4/3 A half-bathroom..has a shower, wash-basin and lavatory, but no bath.
half-blind n.
ΚΠ
1763 J. Boswell London Jrnl. 22 July (1951) 382, I was disturbed by the light..at the earliest dawn, as the windows have only half-blinds.
half-case n.
ΚΠ
1888 C. T. Jacobi Printers' Vocab. 56 Half cases, small cases used for jobbing purposes.
half-door n.
ΚΠ
1735 W. Pardon Dyche's New Gen. Eng. Dict. Hasp, a small Iron or Brass Fastening to a Hatch or half Door.
1843 Dickens Martin Chuzzlewit (1844) iii. 25 The half-door of the bar.
1936 J. Tickell See how they Run ii. 19 The sort of horse's face that looks out over the half-door of a loose-box.
half-frame n.
ΚΠ
1888 C. T. Jacobi Printers' Vocab. 56 Half frames, small composing frames made to hold one pair of cases only.
half-furnace n.
half-gaiter n.
ΚΠ
1775 F. Marion in Harper's Mag. Sept. (1883) 546/1 Black half-gaiters.
half-gown n.
ΚΠ
1552 R. Huloet Abcedarium Anglico Latinum Halfe gowne, hemitogium.
half-hatch n.
ΚΠ
1886 R. Willis & J. W. Clark Archit. Hist. Univ. Cambr. I. 88 A half-hatch door.
ΚΠ
1598 Inv. King's Coll. in R. Willis & J. W. Clark Archit. Hist. Univ. Cambr. (1886) III. 325 Item a halfe head bedsteade of walnuttree.
half-hessian n.
ΚΠ
1837 E. Bulwer-Lytton Ernest Maltravers I. iii. i. 253 A pair of half hessions completed his costume.
half-hoop n. [compare hoop n.1 7]
ΚΠ
1882 Times 31 Jan. 16/6 (advt.) Single-stone, half-hoop, and cluster rings.
1892 R. Kipling Lett. of Trav. (1920) 94 His wife..wears half-hoop diamond rings.
1902 Daily Chron. 14 June 10/4 The hair..is surmounted by a half-hoop diadem encrusted with precious stones.
1928 R. Hall Well of Loneliness xxi. 198 ‘I made your mother's engagement ring for him; a large half-hoop of very fine diamonds.’
1960 R. Collier House called Memory x. 150 Uncle William Henry bought Dora a half hoop of diamonds as an engagement ring.
half-hose n.
ΚΠ
1851 Official Descriptive & Illustr. Catal. Great Exhib. III. 588 Lambs-wool and Cashmere hose and half-hose.
half-jar n.
ΚΠ
1600 Shakespeare Henry IV, Pt. 2 v. iv. 21 If you be not swingde, Ile forsweare halfe kirtles . View more context for this quotation
half-sleeve n.
ΚΠ
1689 London Gaz. No. 2477/4 A sad coloured Cloth Coat, with..blue half Sleeves.
half-stocking n.
ΚΠ
1670 J. Narborough Jrnl. in Acct. Several Late Voy. (1711) i. 104 Some wear Half-Stockings.
half-tester n.
ΚΠ
1803 T. Sheraton Cabinet Dict. 44 As to the particular management of beds, and the articles required in mounting them, together with their various classes; these..will most conveniently come under their respective names, as..Half-tester,..&c.
1859 Blackwood's Edinb. Mag. Aug. 229/1 We approached the bed and examined it—a half-tester, such as is commonly found in attics devoted to servants.
1960 H. Hayward Connoisseur's Handbk. Antique Collecting 279/2 At this period [sc. late 17th cent.] a new type of bedstead without footposts was introduced, known as a ‘half-tester’.
half-tub n.
ΚΠ
1726 G. Shelvocke Voy. round World vi. 198 The old stratagem..of turning a light adrift in a half tub.
half-veil n.
half-wicket n.
ΚΠ
1844 A. R. Smith Adventures Mr. Ledbury I. viii. 105 The..half-wicket that closed the entrance.
n. In various connections: as half-barbarian, half-battle, half-belief, half-believer, half-christian, half-conformity, half-consciousness, half-dark, half-darkness, half-defence, half-defender, half-dream, half-education, half-hint, half-honesty, half-humour, half-knowledge, half-laugh, half-lengthening, half-lie, half-literate, half-look, half-mind, half-power, half-principle, half-quotation, half-reason, half-reasoning, half-repentance, half-savage, half-servant, half-service, half-sleep, half-spacing (on a typewriter), half-view, half-whisper. (In most of these half- has an adverbial force.)
ΚΠ
1597 R. Hooker Of Lawes Eccl. Politie v. lxii. 143 To speake as halfe defendors of the faults.
1597 R. Hooker Of Lawes Eccl. Politie v. lxxxi. 258 They iudge conclusions by dimipremises & halfe principles.
1690 J. Locke Two Treat. Govt. i. ii. (Rtldg.) 6 It is no injury to call an half-quotation an half-reason.
1736 Bp. J. Butler Analogy of Relig. ii. viii. 276 Half-views, which shew but Part of an Object.
1768 J. Boswell Acct. Corsica (ed. 2) ii. 120 A parcel of half-barbarians.
1768–74 A. Tucker Light of Nature (1852) II. 367 A kind of half-reasoning, that suffices to raise difficulties but not pursue them to an issue.
1814 J. Austen Mansfield Park II. vii. 148 A certain half-look attending the..expression of his hope. View more context for this quotation
1816 J. Austen Emma II. xvii. 320 Much that passed between them was in a half-whisper . View more context for this quotation
1816 J. Scott Paris Revisited viii. 237 A kind of stupified half-sleep.
1827 H. Hallam Constit. Hist. Eng. I. viii. 514 To admit of no half conformity in religion.
1836 J. S. Mill in London & Westm. Rev. 25 5 See how incapable half-savages are of co-operation.
1838 J. S. Mill in London & Westm. Rev. 28 454 The sceptics and half-believers of the story.
1838 J. S. Mill in London & Westm. Rev. 31 484 Almost all rich veins of original and striking speculation have been opened by systematic half-minds.
1841 T. Carlyle On Heroes iv. 225 Richter says of Luther's words, ‘his words are half-battles’.
1860 E. B. Pusey Minor Prophets 2 The character of Jehu and his half-belief.
1860 E. B. Pusey Minor Prophets 188 A half-repentance is no repentance.
1860 E. B. Pusey Minor Prophets 199 Another instance of this half-service.
1862 G. Borrow Wild Wales II. xxxii. 370 ‘In truth I am,’ said she, with a half laugh.
1865 E. B. Pusey Eirenicon 3 Unbelievers, or half-believers.
1866 G. MacDonald Ann. Quiet Neighbourhood xxxii, A voice said brokenly in a half-whisper.
1870 J. R. Lowell My Study Windows 349 That half-knowledge which is more mischievous in an editor than down-right ignorance.
1881 ‘M. Twain’ Prince & Pauper 208 His senses struggled to a half-consciousness.
1895 R. Kipling Day's Work (1898) 344 Leading him on to see, more by half-hints than by any direct word, how boys and men are all of a piece.
1898 Pearson's Mag. May 539/1 With a half-power steamer which had only one man all told upon her decks.
1900 Daily News 18 Aug. 6/1 How she did it she didn't know, she said, in a half-humour manner.
1904 W. de la Mare Henry Brocken 13 The half-dream [which] weariness brings.
1904 W. B. Yeats Tables of Law 9 The formalisms of half-education.
1905 Westm. Gaz. 25 Mar. 11/2 The inaccuracies do not matter very much unless they are so gross as to shock the great half-literate.
1926 H. W. Fowler Dict. Mod. Eng. Usage 399/2 The uneasy half-literates who like to prove that they can spell.
1927 A. Clarke Son of Learning ii. 44 In the half-darkness his cowled figure suggests demonic possession.
1928 D. H. Lawrence Lady Chatterley's Lover xvi. 278 She could still see on Connie's face..the half-dream of passion.
a1930 D. H. Lawrence Last Poems (1932) 257 A half-lie causes the immediate contradiction of the half-lie.
1934 E. Blunden Choice or Chance 40 Possessions too,—part fungus and part flower,—Forced on him their half-power.
1934 E. Pound Eleven New Cantos xxxix. 45 From star up to the half-dark.
1937 Mind 46 101 Postulating a sort of extra, separate half-mind—entelechy—like Driesch.
1938 Times Lit. Suppl. 8 Oct. 638/3 The curious delicate half-humour which smiled at his own hypersensitiveness.
1941 T. S. Eliot Dry Salvages ii. 11 The backward half~look Over the shoulder, towards the primitive terror.
1948 T. S. Eliot Notes Def. Culture 105 But what is important is to remember that ‘half-education’ is a modern phenomenon.
1950 A. Koestler in R. Crossman God that Failed 31 Once or twice she spoke on the telephone to comrades of hers—always in half-words and half-hints.
1953 K. H. Jackson Lang. & Hist. Early Brit. 342 Half-lengthening of penultimates could not have arisen until after the accent-shift.
1959 E. Pulgram Introd. Spectrogr. Speech viii. 64 The half~power points, whose power is..proportional to the square of the amplitude.
1961 Imperial Type Faces 10 A half~spacing device lends itself to display work.
1962 Which? Dec. 359/2 If you leave out a letter, it should be possible, after rubbing out the word, to fit in the extra letter by using half-spacing.
o. † half-almond stitch n. Obs.† half-bloom n. Obs. the round mass of iron taken from the puddling furnace, which was hammered and shingled into a ‘bloom’.† half-compass n. Obs. hemisphere: see compass n.1 5b. † half-labour n. Obs. † half-member n. Obs. a semicolon. † half-sphere n. Obs. hemisphere.† half-square n. Obs. (see quots.). † half-vowel n. Obs. a semi-vowel.† half-vowelish adj. Obs. of the nature of a semivowel.
half-Abo n. Austral. (offensive) a person having one Australian Aboriginal parent (cf. Abo n. and adj.).
ΚΠ
1945 C. Mann in B. James Austral. Short Stories (1963) 72 Little black half-abo. piccaninnies.
half-adder n. [adder n.2 3] a unit in an electronic computer (see quot. 1962).
ΚΠ
1954 Electronic Engin. 26 288 Numbers always enter the accumulator loop via the two half-adders and are therefore automatically added to the previous contents.
1962 Gloss. Terms Automatic Data Processing (B.S.I.) 60 Half-adder, a logic element with two outputs and two inputs to which may be applied signals representing a digit or a number and a single addend or carry digit.
half Almain n. (see Almain n. 2).
ΚΠ
a1672 F. Willughby Bk. of Games (2003) 172 Halfe Almond is first a hop, then a stride, then a leape one after another, first hopping with one leg, then striding with the other, & then leaping with both.
a1701 C. Sedley Bellamira v. i, in Wks. (1766) 179, I will leap the half almond with you.
1847 J. O. Halliwell Dict. Archaic & Provinc. Words (1874) 429/2 Half-Hammer, the game of hop, step, and jump.
1893 New Rev. Mar. 285 She laughed; and offered him the half almond, and from that time they remained as good friends as ever.
ΚΠ
1611 J. Florio Queen Anna's New World of Words Mezzo-mandolo, Seamsters call it the halfe-almond stitch.
half-arm n. half arm's length.
ΚΠ
1812 Sporting Mag. 39 18 Each fought at half-arm for superiority.
half-arsed adj.
ΚΠ
1961 A. West Trend is Up ix. 386 You don't know what it is to worry about what half-arsed thing your own son is going to pull on you next.
1972 Observer 24 Sept. 35/2 The sort of half-arsed dottiness they dish out in West End comedies.
half-ass adj.
ΚΠ
1959 N. Mailer Advts. for Myself (1961) 399 He spent years hobnobbing with gentlemanly shits and half-ass operators.
half-assed adj. slang (orig. U.S.) ineffectual, inadequate, mediocre; stupid, inexperienced.
ΚΠ
1932 Amer. Speech 7 333 Half-assed, mediocre; insignificant.
1955 W. Gaddis Recognitions i. v. 183 A half-assed critic..thinks he has to make you unhappy before you'll take him seriously.
half-barrel adj. semicylindrical (vaulting).
ΚΠ
a1878 G. G. Scott Lect. Mediæval Archit. (1879) I. 56 The abandonment of the half-barrel vaulting of the aisles.
half-belt n. (see quot. 1957).
ΚΠ
1957 M. B. Picken Fashion Dict. 19 Half b[elt], belt which extends only half-way around body; especially one across back section of garment, as on sports jackets or coats.
1960 Farmer & Stockbreeder 9 Feb. (Suppl.) 5/1 A..jacket with a half-belt at the back.
half-bend n. a half fillet for the head.
ΚΠ
1834 J. R. Planché Hist. Brit. Costume 48 Canute's queen wears..either the diadem or the half-bend.
half-bent n. (a) the condition of being half-bent; (b) the catch by which the hammer of a gun is placed at half-cock.
ΚΠ
1774 O. Goldsmith Grecian Hist. II. i. 11 With one leg put forward, and the knee upon the half-bent.
1881 W. W. Greener Gun & its Devel. 259 A half-bent in the tumbler that prevents the hammer being accidentally pushed down.
ΚΠ
1678 Philos. Trans. 1677 (Royal Soc.) 12 934 The Metal runs together into a round Mass or Lump, which they call a Half-Bloom.
half-boarder n. one who has half his board, a day-boarder.
ΚΠ
1711 R. Steele Spectator No. 36. ⁋8 They [birds]..may be taken as Half-Boarders.
1836 E. Howard Rattlin xiii, The half-boarders whispered their fears to the ushers.
half-box n. a box open at one side.
ΚΠ
1885 C. T. Davis Manuf. Leather 479 The support is provided with two half-boxes.
half-braid n. (see quot. 1882).
ΚΠ
1882 S. F. A. Caulfeild & B. C. Saward Dict. Needlework 42 Half, or Shadow, or Lace Braid, the passement is pricked, as in cloth braid, and twelve pairs of bobbins put on.
half-bull n. (a) a pontifical letter issued by a new pope before his coronation, so called because the bulla is impressed with only one side of the seal, that representing the apostles (Giry); (b) [bull n.1 7] slang a half-crown.
ΚΠ
1789 Sessions' Papers June 550/1 Bulls and half bulls are crowns and half crowns, in coiner's language, and a bob is a shilling.
1853 Dickens Bleak House xlvi. 448 Four half bulls, wot you may call halfcrowns.
1906 E. Dyson Fact'ry 'Ands xvi. 216 I've gotter get that 'arf-bull 'r somethin' dangerous may set in.
half-catch n. (see quot. 1890).
ΚΠ
1890 Daily News 28 Aug. 6/4 What is called the ‘half-catch’ system—i.e., the owner of the boat (who is usually a fisherman) provides the fishing gear, and receives in return half of the total catch of fish.
half-cell n. Electr. (see quot. 1943).
ΚΠ
1940 Chambers's Techn. Dict. 399/1 Half-cell.
1943 Gloss. Terms Electr. Engin. (B.S.I.) v. 93 Half cell, of an electrolytic cell: an electrode and that part of the electrolyte with which it is in contact.
half-centre n. (see quot. half-centre n.).
ΚΠ
1888 Lockwood's Dict. Mech. Engin. Half-centre, half-centre is sometimes used to denote the position of the crank-pin of an engine when midway between the two dead centres or dead points.
half-chronometer n. (see quot. 1884).
ΚΠ
1884 F. J. Britten Watch & Clockmakers' Handbk. (new ed.) 115 Half Chronometer..originally used to denote watches having an escapement compounded of the lever and chronometer, appears now to be applied to fine lever watches which have been adjusted for temperature.
half-class n. a class that is half one and half another.
ΚΠ
1845 A. M. Hall Whiteboy ix. 76 There was nothing..to distinguish L.M. from the half class—neither gentleman nor farmer.
half-column n. a column or pilaster half projecting from a flat surface.
ΚΠ
1726 J. Leoni Life Alberti in tr. L. B. Alberti Archit. 4 Four half Columns of the composite order.
half-commission n. attrib. working for or based on half commission.
ΚΠ
1909 Westm. Gaz. 16 Feb. 7/4 He became a half-commission man with a firm of stockbrokers.
1927 Sunday Express 13 Mar. 2 A half-commission stockbroker.
1931 Times 16 Mar. 18/1 The Half Commission Practice.
half-communion n. communion in one kind, as practised in the Roman Catholic Church.
ΚΠ
1660 Bp. J. Taylor Ductor Dubitantium I. ii. iii. 488 The half-communion is by the Council of Constance affirmed to be different from the institution of Christ.
1687 Reflect. Hawk & Panther 27 The Half-Communion is no older, than the time of Acquinas.
ΚΠ
1587 Sir P. Sidney & A. Golding tr. P. de Mornay Trewnesse Christian Relig. vi. 82 The daysunne..which inlighteneth not onely the halfe compasse whereon he shineth, but also euen a part of that which seeth him not.
half-compression n. attrib. designating a device for lessening the compression of the explosive mixture in an internal-combustion engine.
ΚΠ
1901 Motor-Car World 2 317/1 To facilitate starting the engine a half-compression device is fitted which operates on the exhaust valve through the medium of a second or subsidiary cam attached to the main cam working the exhaust.
1907 Westm. Gaz. 11 Nov. 7/2 The simple half-compression gear.
half-course n.
ΚΠ
1883 W. S. Gresley Gloss. Terms Coal Mining Half-course, half on the level and half on the dip.
half-coward n. (see quot. 1861).
ΚΠ
1861 Jrnl. Royal Agric. Soc. 22 i. 41 Unless the whole evening's milk is skimmed and added to the whole new morning's milk—in which case the cheese made is ‘half-coward’—the produce, whether single or double, is said to be whole-milk cheese.
half-day n. half a working day (cf. day n. 6).
ΚΠ
1791 F. Burney Jrnl. 31 July (1972) I. 2 One precious half Day I was indulged with my kindest Mr. Lock.
1876 C. Schreiber Jrnl. (1911) I. 477 We found that we could not execute all our little shoppings.., because the Saturday is but a half-day.
1932 Discovery Mar. 71/2 Now the minimum wage [for farm workers] is 30s. per week of five shorter days and a half day.
1973 Daily Tel. 8 Feb. 1/1 The Shadow Cabinet decided to give up a half-day of its Parliamentary time to complete the debate in the Commons.
half-dike n. a sunk fence.
ΚΠ
1808 R. Forsyth Beauties Scotl. V. 421 Ditches, hedges, and half-dikes or sunk-fences.
half-dress n. (see quot. 1960).
ΚΠ
1788 E. Sheridan Let. in Betsy Sheridan's Jrnl. (1986) vi. 138 Great coats made very open before to shew the peticoat—in Undress—half dress, Night gown and peticoat with fine muslin Aprons—full dress I have not seen.
1815 La Belle Assemblée Sept. Pl., Autumnal Walking Dress... The head dress must be either a half~dress cap, or a white satin gipsy, or Wellington hat.
a1827 W. Hickey Mem. (1918) II. xx. 261 A tailor named Knill..advised my having a dark green with gold binding..and for half dress a Bon de Paris with gold frogs.
1850 Ladies' Gaz. Fashion Aug. 255/1 Plain mousseline de soie..begins to be a good deal seen in half-dress.
1960 C. W. Cunnington et al. Dict. Eng. Costume 100/2 Half dress, late 18th and 19th c's... The costume worn at day functions and at informal evening ones.
half-duck n. = half-bird n.
ΚΠ
1892 W. J. Gordon Our Country's Birds 10 Local and Popular Names... Half Duck.
1903 J. A. Hamilton MS. in Red Box 329 Good sport among the half-duck and mussel-duck which abounded at Tudworth.
half-evergreen adj. of a plant that is evergreen in a mild climate; also as n.
ΚΠ
1934 Webster's New Internat. Dict. Eng. Lang. Half-evergreen.
1952 A. G. L. Hellyer Sanders' Encycl. Gardening (ed. 22) 131 Glaucophylla, half-evergreen.
half-flat n. †(a) one of the shapes into which a ‘bloom’ of iron was worked; (b) half of a flat n.2 or entire storey of a house.
ΚΠ
1784 H. Cort Specif. Patent in Repertory of Arts (1795) 3 365 Anconies, bars, half flats.
1889 D. Masson in T. De Quincey Wks. I. Gen. Pref. 16 A half-flat set of apartments on the second floor of..a house of six such half-flats in all, accessible by a common stair.
half-foot n. (see quot. 1880).
ΚΠ
c1450 Jacob's Well (1900) 129 Þe secunde half-fote wose in coueytise is raueyne.
1814 Gen. Rep. Agric. State & Polit. Circumstances Scotl. App. ii. 396 Half foot, is another method of occupying a farm, equally barbarous in itself, and adverse to improvement. It is not so prevalent in the Highlands, as in some of the Western Isles.
1873 Trans. Highland & Agric. Soc. 5 298 Out or led farms like the metayers of France, or the half-foot tenants of the Hebrides.
1880 W. F. Skene Celtic Scotl. III. 370 A kind of tenancy called half-foot, where the possessor of the farm furnished the land and seed corn,..the produce being divided.
half-frame n. (a) (in pl.) reading-spectacles consisting of only the lower half of the frames and lenses; also in sing. attrib.; (b) Photogr. half the standard 35 mm. picture size.
ΚΠ
1961 Colour Photogr. vi. 249/3 The normal 20-exposure cassette gives 40 half-frame exposures and the 36-exposure cassette gives 72 so that each colour transparency would cost less than 6d.
1967 A. Flowers in L. Deighton London Dossier 170 Buy one of the half-frame cameras such as the Olympus Pen D2 or the Canon Dial.
1968 ‘J. Hudson’ Case of Need i. i. 10 ‘Call me,’ Sanderson said, peering over his half frames.
1968 L. Deighton Only when I Larf ii. 17 Strange half-frame spectacles that he peered over abstractedly.
half-gerund n. (see quot. 1924).
ΚΠ
1898 H. Sweet New Eng. Gram. ii. 121 The absence of a distinction between common case and genitive in the plural often makes it impossible in the spoken language to distinguish between gerund and half-gerund, as in to prevent the ladies leaving us, I generally ordered the table to be removed.., where the..alteration of ladies into ladies' would make leaving into a full gerund.
1898 H. Sweet New Eng. Gram. ii. 121 There seems little doubt that the colloquial half-gerunds in such causal constructions as she caught cold sitting on the damp grass..have arisen through dropping a preposition.
1924 H. E. Palmer Gram. Spoken Eng. 168 In certain constructions the ing form has a function intermediate between that of the present participle and the gerund. Sweet suggests for such cases the term half-gerund.
half-hatchet n. ‘a hatchet with one straight line, all the projection of the bit being on the side towards the hand’ (E. H. Knight Pract. Dict. Mech. 1875).
half-header n. a half-brick used to close the work at the end of a course.
half-hose n. (see hose n. 1a(c)).
half-house n. a shed open at the side; a hovel.
ΚΠ
1737 H. Bracken Farriery Improved xliv. 582 A Hovel or half House for them to run into.
1895 R. Kipling in Pall Mall Gaz. 25 Oct. 3/1 When they were tired Kotuko would make what the hunters call a ‘half-house’.
Categories »
half-hunt n. Bell-ringing see hunt n.1
half inferior adj. Bot. (see quots.).
ΚΠ
1900 B. D. Jackson Gloss. Bot. Terms 118/1 Half inferior, used of an ovary when the stamens are perigynous.
1940 Chambers's Techn. Dict. 399/1 Half inferior, said of a flower in which the receptacle forms a cup which is adherent to the base of the ovary and partly up its side.
half-integer n. any member of the set of numbers obtained by dividing the odd integers by two.
ΚΠ
1928 Proc. Physical Soc. 40 332 The number m can take only certain discrete values (either integers or half-integers).
1971 P. Hlawiczka Introd. Quantum Electronics xvi. 247 The quantum numbers j1 and j2 may be either integers or half integers.
half-integral adj.
ΚΠ
1930 A. E. Ruark & H. C. Urey Atoms, Molecules & Quanta vii. 187 Many authors use j + ½ instead, when j is half-integral.
1968 M. S. Livingston Particle Physics ii. 24 Nuclei with an odd number of protons plus electrons, each with half-integral spin, should result in half-integral nuclear angular momenta.
ΚΠ
1805 R. Forsyth Beauties Scotl. II. 443 The rent was frequently paid in kind, or in what was called half-labour... One-half of the crop went to the landlord.
half-landing n. a landing half-way up a flight of stairs.
ΚΠ
1910 Daily Chron. 1 Feb. 1/1, I saw the proprietor,..perched on the half-landing of the stairs.
1965 ‘T. Hinde’ Games of Chance i. i. 16 The black and lemon half-landing bathroom.
half-lap n. (see lap n.3 2b).
half-lattice girder n. one consisting of a single system or row of triangles.
ΚΠ
a1877 E. H. Knight Pract. Dict. Mech. II. 1049/2 Half-lattice girder, a form of girder..consisting of horizontal upper and lower bars, and a series of diagonal bars, sloping alternately in opposite directions, and dividing the space between the bars into a series of triangles.
half-lichen n. an ascomycete attaching itself parasitically to an alga and thus simulating a lichenoid association.
ΚΠ
1902 D. H. Campbell Text-bk. Bot. 188 Sphæria lemaneæ and Thermutis velutina are examples of the Half-lichens.
half-lift n. [lift n.2 5f] a medium-stressed lift in Old English verse.
ΚΠ
1894 H. Sweet Anglo-Saxon Reader (ed. 7) p. xc, To make up for the want of an accompanying dip, an extra medium-stressed half-lift is made obligatory.
1967 C. L. Wrenn Study Old Eng. Lit. 38 Five basic combinations of stress or lift of the voice, half or secondary stress or half-lift, and unstressed syllables.
half-line n. [line n.2 23e] Prosody half of a line of verse, used esp. of Old English and related verse.
ΚΠ
1864 H. Morley Eng. Writers I. 251 The most important is a heroic poem..extending..to 6357 of the short Anglo-Saxon lines, or half lines, as they are usually printed.
1900 A. S. Cook Christ of Cynewulf 70 Half-line space.
1910 F. Tupper Riddles of Exeter Bk. 220 The half-line is of the A-type..common in the Riddles.
1927 E. V. Gordon Introd. Old Norse 293 In ON. tradition the unit verse was not the long line, but the half-line, which was called a vísa or line.
1964 Eng. Stud. 45 38 The patronymic epithet is separated from its antecedent by at least a full half-line.
1965 Eng. Stud. 46 420 In Germanic the basic principle is stress, together with a division into half-lines.
half-margin n. (see quots.).
ΚΠ
1851 Orders & Regulations Royal Engineers (rev. ed.) iii. 13 The Paper must be folded in the centre, lengthways, by which it will be divided, equally, into what is technically termed half-margin.
1851 Orders & Regulations Royal Engineers (rev. ed.) iii. 13 All Official Letters for the Inspector-General are..to be written on half margin.
half-mask n. a mask covering part of the face, such as is worn with a domino (domino n.).
ΚΠ
1762 R. Lowth Short Introd. Eng. Gram. (1838) 195 The Semicolon, or Half-member, is a less constructive part, or subdivision, of a sentence or member.
half-orbed adj. now rare (of the moon) with half of its orb illuminated; also fig.
ΚΠ
1737 R. Glover Leonidas ix. 312 His phalanx soon Leonidas commands To circle backward..: Their order changes; now half-orb'd they stand.
1787 J. Barlow Vision of Columbus i. 3 The half-orb'd moon declining to the main.
1880 E. Poste tr. Aratus Skies & Weather-forecasts 38 Half-orbed, her [sc. the moon's] promise holds To full moon.
1901 Christian Advocate 12 Sept. 1456/1 A half-orbed faith busies itself forever with what it calls ‘the other world’.
half-pass n. (see quot. 1948).
ΚΠ
1929 Man. Horsemastership, Equitation & Driving ii. 115 The bending lesson includes..the ‘half passage’ or ‘half pass’... In all lateral movements the forehand must slightly precede the hind quarters.
1948 E. Schmit-Jensen Equestrian Olympic Games App. 95 At the Half Pass the horse moves on two tracks... The outside legs pass and cross in front of the inside legs... The legs on the side to which the horse is moving are the inside legs; those on the opposite side the outside legs.
half-period n. the half-life (half-life n.) of a substance; see also quot. 19041.
ΚΠ
1904 G. F. Goodchild & C. F. Tweney Technol. & Sci. Dict. 277/2 The area included in this curve is the first half period element.
1904 G. F. Goodchild & C. F. Tweney Technol. & Sci. Dict. 277/2 The effect of the whole wave can be expressed in terms of these half period components.
1905 Nature 13 Apr. 574/1 Different samples gave for the half-period of decay from 52 to 55 seconds.
1942 J. D. Stranathan ‘Particles’ of Mod. Physics xi. 448 One product of the nuclear disruption was a Ba isotope having a half period of 86 minutes.
half-pint n. [compare sense 2a] fig. a small or insignificant person; also attrib.
ΚΠ
1926 G. H. Maines & B. Grant Wise-crack Dict. 9/1 Half pint, stunted individual.
1929 W. R. Burnett Little Caesar iv. ii. 117 ‘Here's the half-pint,’ said Killer Pepi, pushing Joe Sansone forward.
1930 G. C. Myers Mod. Parent ix. 165 Here are types of remarks which some parents..will stoop to make: ‘What do you think of our half-pint?’
1938 P. G. Wodehouse Summer Moonshine xvii. 200 That wonder girl in whose half-pint person were combined all the lovely qualities of woman of which he had so often dreamed.
1943 C. H. Ward-Jackson Piece of Cake 35 Half-pint hero, swaggerer.
1948 ‘N. Shute’ No Highway iii. 82 The little half-pint size, with thick glasses?
half-plane n. Math. (see quot. 1959).
ΚΠ
1891 A. Cayley Wks. XIII. 191 The author [sc. Schwartz] considers the orthomorphic transformation (or, as I call it, the orthomorphosis) of a square into the infinite half-plane, or into a circle.
1927 H. G. Forder Found. Euclidean Geom. iii. 68 The regions into which a line a separates a plane ω in which it lies are the ‘half-planes from a in ω’.
1959 G. James & R. C. James Math. Dict. (ed. 2) 182/1 Half-plane, the part of a plane which lies on one side of a line in the plane.
1968 P. A. P. Moran Introd. Probability Theory x. 473 In the cases considered the domain is a rectangle, an infinite strip, a half-plane, or infinite quadrant.
half-plate n. Photogr. (see plate n. 21); also attrib.
ΚΠ
1877 Design & Work 3 451/1 Half-plate portrait lens.
1884 F. J. Britten Watch & Clockmakers' Handbk. (new ed.) 116 Half Plate, a watch in which the top pivot of the fourth wheel pinion is carried in a cock so as to allow of the use of a larger balance.
1888 C. T. Jacobi Printers' Vocab. 56 Half plate paper, machine made paper of fine and soft texture used for woodcuts.
1892 Photogr. Ann. II. 58 On your slide you require to get all the view on the half-plate negative.
1903 A. Watkins Photogr. (ed. 2) 13 Half-plate is the favourite amateur size.
half-portion n. a half of a portion; fig. a small or insignificant person.
ΚΠ
1907 F. H. Burnett Shuttle xxxviii. 379 Adroit manipulation of ‘portions’ and ‘half portions’..enabled them to add variety to their bill of fare.
1919 P. G. Wodehouse Their Mutual Child i. v. 66 He certainly is a kind o' half-portion, ma'am.
1967 P. G. Wodehouse Company for Henry vii. 130 Even when calling her a squirt and a half-portion he had thought of her as a comely squirt and a half-portion with plenty of sex appeal.
1967 L. Deighton Expensive Place ii. 14 [He] did not like orders for..charcuterie as a main dish or half-portions of anything.
half-press n. (see quot. 1883).
ΚΠ
1883 H. P. Smith Gloss. Terms & Phr. Half-press, the work done by one man at a printing-press.
Categories »
half-principal n. Carpentry ‘a rafter which does not extend to the crown of the roof’ (E. H. Knight Pract. Dict. Mech. 1875).
half-pull n. Bell-ringing (see quot.).
ΚΠ
1684 R. Howlett School Recreat. 90 Ringing at Half-pulls is now the modern general Practice: that is, when one Change is made at Fore-stroke, another at Back-stroke, etc.
1872 H. T. Ellacombe Church Bells Devon iii. 36 What the trade would probably consider a ‘pull’ is, in ringing, termed only a half-pull.
half-race n. Bot. (see quots.).
ΚΠ
1906 R. H. Lock Variation, Hered. & Evol. v. 141 In the case of a half-race a small percentage only of seedlings is found to produce plants which show the racial character.
1906 R. H. Lock Variation, Hered. & Evol. v. 145 A half-race might have been defined as a strain in which the character of the complete race is usually latent, and only rarely appears.
1928 B. D. Jackson Gloss. Bot. Terms (ed. 4) 169/2 Half-race, a form intermediate between a species and a variety of it, producing but few seedlings of the racial character, the majority reverting to the specific type.
half-relief n. = demi-relief n. at demi- prefix 12a.
half-rhyme n. an imperfect or near rhyme.
ΚΠ
1830 B. Thorpe tr. R. K. Rask Gram. Anglo-Saxon Tongue 139 Line-Rime is when two syllables, in the same line of verse, have their vowels and the consonants following them alike, which is called perfect rime (consonances), or unlike vowels, and only the following consonants the same, which is called half rime (assonances).
1860 G. P. Marsh Lect. Eng. Lang. xxv. 553 In Icelandic poetry,..imperfect rhyme is regularly employed, and..is called skothendíng,..which we may conveniently translate by half-rhyme.
1860 G. P. Marsh Lect. Eng. Lang. xxv. 560 Although half-rhyme may be said to be peculiar to Icelandic poetry,..yet there are examples of the employment of both full and imperfect line-rhymes in modern English.
c1873–4 G. M. Hopkins Note-bks. & Papers (1937) 243 In Icelandic verse an opposite kind of alliteration (skothendíng) is made use of, namely ending with the same consonant but after a different vowel, as ‘bad’ ‘led’, ‘find’ ‘band’, ‘sin’ ‘run’ (from Marsh, who calls it half-rhyme).
1886 J. M. D. Meiklejohn Eng. Lang. ii. 186 The English language is very poor in rhymes, when compared with Italian or German. Accordingly, half-rhymes are admissible..: sun/gone, love/move, allow/bestow, etc.
1936 M. Roberts Faber Bk. Mod. Verse 28 In Owen's war poetry, the half-rhymes almost invariably fall from a vowel of high pitch to one of low pitch.
half-rhymed adj.
ΚΠ
1960 D. S. R. Welland Wilfred Owen vi. 115 Only in ‘Arms and the Boy’, ‘Wild with All Regrets’, and ‘Strange Meeting’ does he [sc. Wilfred Owen] write in half-rhymed couplets throughout.
half-ripper n.
ΚΠ
1841 Penny Cycl. XX. 476/2 The ripping-saw, half-ripper, hand-saw..are saws for the use of one person.
half-rip n. (also half-rip saw) a finer-toothed ripping saw (see rip n.3 2, ripper n. 2, ripsaw n.).
ΚΠ
1840 Mechanics' Mag. 15 Feb. 347/1 By this means from a dovetail saw to a half rip may be properly set.
1875 Carp. & Join. 14 Hand saw, divided into the largest or rip saw, intermediate or half-rip, and smallest.
1905 J. Wright Home Mechanic v. 71 The half rip..has larger teeth with less set than the cross cut, and smaller teeth with more set than the rip saw.
1986 Do It Yourself June 55/1 For natural timber, the rip or coarse-cutting blade is used for cutting along the grain and for general rough carpentry work.
2005 R. Laughton Success with Joints Introd. 16 A small ripsaw, sometimes called a half-rip, is the preferred tool for cutting along the grain.
half-roll n. Aeronaut. a manoeuvre in which the aircraft turns through 180° about the longitudinal axis.
ΚΠ
1934 V. M. Yeates Winged Victory i. iii. 29 The same with the half-roll. Nothing would half-roll like a Camel. A twitch of the stick and flick of the rudder and you were on your back.
half-roll v. intr.
ΚΠ
1926 J. M. Grider War Birds 206, I half rolled on top of him, he half rolled too.
1934Half-roll [see half-roll n.]. half-royal n. a kind of millboard or pasteboard.
half-secret dovetail n. (see quot.).
ΚΠ
1904 G. F. Goodchild & C. F. Tweney Technol. & Sci. Dict. 277/2 Half secret dovetail, a dovetail of the form used in a drawer front; it is concealed in a front view, but visible in the side of the drawer when drawn out.
half-shade n. Painting a shade of half the extreme depth.
ΚΠ
1874 R. St. J. Tyrwhitt Our Sketching Club 240 Paint the half-shades in first.
half-sheet n. Printing the off-cut portion of a duodecimo (Knight, 1875); (see quots.).
ΚΠ
1683 J. Moxon Mech. Exercises II. 234 In Half-sheets, all the Pages belonging to the White Paper and Reteration are Imposed in one Chase, and are plac'd, as you see by the Drafts..of Half-sheet Forms.
1888 C. T. Jacobi Printers' Vocab. 56 Book-work is sometimes printed in ‘half-sheet’ fashion. When thus printed there are two copies on one sheet.
1914 T. L. De Vinne Mod. Book Composition ix. 336 It is called half-sheet because this larger sheet must be cut in halves before either half can be folded.
1952 E. J. Labarre Dict. Paper (ed. 2) 122/1 Half-sheet, printing a whole sheet of a book so that all the pages of a signature are in one forme.
1964 F. Bowers Bibliogr. & Textual Crit. iv. ii. 109 The work-and-turn method of printing by half-sheet imposition.
half-shoe n. (see quot.); (also) a shoe on one side only of a horse's foot.
ΚΠ
1552 R. Huloet Abcedarium Anglico Latinum Halfe shoes beynge of suche fashion, that aboue they couer but the toes.
half-sibling n. each of two or more individuals having one parent in common.
ΚΠ
1903 Biometrika 2 391 The high values, however, found for half-siblings in the case of the thoroughbreds.
1938 Jrnl. Royal Anthropol. Inst. 213 The mother allows the children to invite their half-siblings.
1959 B. Wootton Social Sci. & Social Pathol. iii. 85 Some authors state whether deceased, half- or step-siblings are included, or whether the delinquent himself is counted in the total of family members.
half-slip n. the lower half of a slip (see slip n.3 4c); a petticoat.
ΚΠ
1952 H. Waugh Last seen Wearing (1953) 31 ‘What about her..under~garments?’ ‘Half-slip, pants, and bra.’
1957 M. B. Picken Fashion Dict. 313/1 Half slip, any of the various types of slips starting at the waistline.
Categories »
half-sole n. that part of the sole of a boot or shoe which extends forward from the shank to the toe.
half-sole v. trans. to furnish with new half-soles.
ΚΠ
1795 J. Pettigrew & E. Pettigrew Let. 5 Apr. in Pettigrew Papers (MS, Univ. N. Carolina) I have not got my shoes halfsoaled yet, as shewmakers are very scarce.
1861 F. W. Robinson No Church I. ii. 71 Two days at Penberriog to rest his ankle and get his boots half-soled.
1911 H. S. Harrison Queed xxi. 267 If you're ever in Petersburg and want any half-soling done.
half-space n. = half-pace n. 2.
ΚΠ
1823 P. Nicholson New Pract. Builder 439 The floor between the two flights is termed a half-space or resting-place.
half-speed shaft n. the cam shaft of a four-stroke cycle internal-combustion engine, which rotates at half the speed of the crank shaft.
ΚΠ
1902 A. C. Harmsworth et al. Motors viii. 152 A crank, operated by a connecting rod from the half-speed shaft on the engine.
?1905 G. F. Goodchild & C. F. Tweney Technol. & Sci. Dict. 420/2 The half speed shaft, rotating at one half the speed of the crank shaft.
ΚΠ
1611 B. Jonson Catiline i. i. 63 Let..Day, At shewing but thy head forth, start away From this halfe-spheare . View more context for this quotation
ΚΠ
1662 S. Pepys Diary 18 Aug. (1970) III. 169 The whole mystery of off [half]-square, wherein the King is abused in the timber that he buys.
1674 W. Leybourn Compl. Surveyor (ed. 3) 345 Most Artificers when they meet with Squared Timber, whose breadth and depth are unequal..usually add the breadth and depth together, and take the half for a Mean Square, and so proceed..If the difference be great, the Error is very obnoxious either to Buyer or Seller.
Categories »
half-stitch n. a loose open stitch in braid work or pillow-lace making (Caulfeild Dict. Needlewk. 259).
half-storey n. an upper storey half the height of which is in the walls and half in the roof.
ΚΠ
1618 in R. Willis & J. W. Clark Archit. Hist. Univ. Cambr. (1886) I. 206 The halfe storie to be eight foote and a halfe.
1886 R. Willis & J. W. Clark Archit. Hist. Univ. Cambr. II. 737 The dormer-gablets of the half-storey.
half-stress n. Prosody a secondary stress.
ΚΠ
1938 A. Campbell Battle of Brunanburh 24 Graz..regarding butu as having a half-stress on the second syllable.
1961 Rev. Eng. Stud. 12 345 Long and short syllables must be distinguised in scansion, when they bear either a strong stress or a half-stress.
half-stuff n. Paper-making partly prepared pulp.
ΚΠ
1766 S. Clark Leadbetter's Royal Gauger (ed. 6) ii. xiv. 370 In these Mortars the Rags are beaten into what is called Half-stuff.
a1836 Encycl. Metrop. (1845) VII. 764 A mill in which the rags are ground to a coarse imperfect pulp, called half stuff.
1912 Chambers's Jrnl. Oct. 671/2 The pulp—at this stage commonly called half-stuff—is fed into beating-engines.
half-swing plough n. (see quot. 1875).
ΚΠ
1875 W. D. Parish Dict. Sussex Dial. Half-swing Plough, a plough in which the mould-board is a fixture.
half-term n. a period approximately half-way through a school or other term, often made the occasion of a holiday; freq. attrib. as in half-term holiday.
ΚΠ
1888 Boy's Own Paper Summer No. 16/2 At half-term it was Hoskyn's custom to write letters to all the parents with reports of their sons' progress.
1944 L. A. G. Strong All fall Down 55 It's half term, as even you must have realised.
1950 Hodgkinson & Muir in R. M. Scrimgeour North London Collegiate Sch. 1850–1950 v. 101 Miss Drummond spent a half-term morning in her Sussex cottage trying to see whether, if girls spent the whole day at Canons, they could be supplied with adequate teaching there.
half-text n. a size of handwriting half the size of ‘text’ or large hand.
ΚΠ
1845 J. W. Carlyle Lett. I. 322 Writing in half text on ruled paper.
half-thickness n. Physics = half-value n. thickness.
ΚΠ
1950 S. Glasstone Sourcebk. Atomic Energy vii. 170/2 The mass half-thickness, i.e., the actual..half-thickness multiplied by the density, is almost independent of the material absorbing the gamma rays.
1958 W. K. Mansfield Elem. Nucl. Physics v. 45 To compare the penetrating power of the γ-rays with that of α and β-rays, it is necessary to estimate the half-thickness.
1960 J. N. Gregory World of Radioisotopes i. 9 The shorter the wavelength of the γ-radiation the greater the half-thickness.
half-throw n.
half-tint n. (see quot. 1860-4).
ΚΠ
1812 Examiner 25 May 328/1 The brilliant lights relieving from a large proportion of half tints.
1860–4 Dict. Archit. (Archit. Publ. Soc.) Half-tint,..in a monochrome, it embraces all gradations between positive white and black.
half-title n. the short title of a book often placed in front of the full title.
ΚΠ
1879 F. J. Furnivall New Shakspere Soc. Rep. 8 The notes on the back of the half-title of the Part.
half-tongue n. Law a jury of which one half were foreigners, formerly allowed to a foreigner tried on a criminal charge.
ΚΠ
1494 Act 11 Hen. VII c. 21 All Attaints..upon any Record, wherein the triall and enquest was by halfe tongue.
half-trap n. a semicircular depression in a sewer pipe.
Categories »
half-travel n. half the full movement of a piston, valve, etc.
half-turning bolt n. (see quot. a1877).
ΚΠ
a1877 E. H. Knight Pract. Dict. Mech. II. 1050 Half-turning bolt, one with a thread occupying one half of its cylindrical surface.
half-uncial n. writing which combines the characters of uncial and cursive; semi-uncial; also attrib.
ΚΠ
1885 Encycl. Brit. XVIII. 153/2 Examples of half-uncial writing.
1897 H. W. Johnston Latin MSS. 70 Half-Uncials are derived from the uncials and represent the last efforts of the book hand to differentiate itself from the improved business hand of the time... It is also called the Roman Uncial and Pre-Caroline Minuscule.
1912 E. M. Thompson Introd. Greek & Lat. Palaeogr. 305 It is the Half-uncial hand which we find employed as far back as the fifth century as a literary hand in the production of formally written MSS.
1926 E. A. Lowe in C. G. Crump & E. F. Jacob Legacy of Middle Ages 209 Before developing a minuscule Irish calligraphers had created a majuscule, the Irish half-uncial as it is styled, of which the Book of Kells, a work of unsurpassed skill and artistry, is the most eminent example.
half-valve n. Music (see quot. 1955).
ΚΠ
1946 M. Mezzrow & B. Wolfe Really Blues i. 12 Yellow's half-valve inflections and slurs.
1955 L. Feather Encycl. Jazz vii. 292 Boy meets Horn, a showpiece displaying the novel style and tone he popularized using ‘half-valve’ effect (a squeezed tonal sound obtained by depressing the valve halfway).
half-valved adj.
ΚΠ
1958 S. Dance in P. Gammond Decca Bk. Jazz xxiii. 297 Original creations like Boy meets horn with its stifled, half-valved statements.
half-valving n.
ΚΠ
1956 S. Traill Play that Music viii. 87 Some players achieve a sort of ‘blue note’ effect by ‘half-valving’, which would mean, in our particular example, pressing the middle valve (for a correct E♭) half down. The distortion of tone which this produces is not very attractive, and I would discourage ‘half-valving’ altogether.
half-verse n. Prosody = half-line n.
ΚΠ
1711 J. Addison Spectator No. 39. ¶5, I do not dislike the Speeches in our English Tragedy that close with an Hemistick, or half Verse.
1876 H. Sweet Anglo-Saxon Reader p. xcviii, There is often only one alliterative letter in the first half verse.
1907 F. A. Blackburn Exodus & Daniel p. x, Uncorrected errors are few, though occasional omissions occur, generally of a half-verse.
1938 A. Campbell Battle of Brunanburh 16 It will be convenient to group its half-verses in the ‘five types’ of Sievers.
half-virgin n. = demi-vierge n.
ΚΠ
1946 A. Koestler Thieves in Night 165 As obscene and shocking to me as a petting party with a half-virgin.
1965 N. Freeling Criminal Conversat. ii. xv. 164, I imagined, being full of valuable premedical catch-phrases, that she was ‘half-virgin’ and therefore despicable.
ΚΠ
1577 B. Googe tr. C. Heresbach Foure Bks. Husbandry i. f. 11, Varro deuideth his husbandry necessaries into..vowels,..halfe vowels,..and mutes.
ΚΠ
a1637 B. Jonson Eng. Gram. i. iv, in Wks. (1640) III L Is a Letter halfe-vowellish.
half-water n. = half-tide n.
ΚΠ
1883 R. L. Stevenson Treasure Island iv. xix. 152 The low, sandy spit..is joined at half-water to Skeleton Island.
half-watt adj. Electr. applied to a gas-filled incandescent lamp consuming approximately a half-watt per candle-power.
ΚΠ
1913 Lighting Jrnl. 1 207/1 (heading) A half watt lamp!.. The types which it is expected to first develop..operate at an efficiency of half a watt per candlepower.
1915 Nature 9 Dec. 407/1 With electricity generated in modern power-houses, and ordinary metal filament lamps, 750,000 candle-power-hours are generated per ton of coal, compared with 260,000 c.p. per ton of coal when gas and modern gas mantles are used. The extended use of so-called ‘half-watt’ lamps will soon double this 750,000.
1932 N. Royde-Smith Incredible Tale 57 The white glare of the half-watt lamp hanging from the studio roof.
half-wave n. one-half of a complete wave, esp. of electricity or radiation; freq. attrib., utilizing only alternate halves of a sequence of waves, as half-wave rectification ( Chambers's Techn. Dict. 1940); half a wave-length long, as half-wave antenna, half-wave dipole, etc.
ΚΠ
1904 G. F. Goodchild & C. F. Tweney Technol. & Sci. Dict. 278/1 Half wave plate, a plate of doubly refracting crystal, capable of splitting up a plane polarised ray into two portions, one of which is retarded half a wave length with respect to the other.
1912 Motor Man. (ed. 14) ii. 33 When the platinum contacts at the end of the armature touch, one-half of every complete wave flows into the accumulator, and when the contacts separate, the reverse wave of the current is interrupted at the zero or no-voltage line; thus only the half-waves of current flowing in the same direction are used.
1926 R. W. Hutchinson First Course Wireless viii. 145 If the first half-wave is positive the grid will become positive.
1926 R. W. Hutchinson First Course Wireless viii. 145 The next half-wave is negative and this still further lowers the potential of the grid.
1928 Morning Post 6 Feb. 3/4 A half wave rectifier.
1943 Gloss. Terms Telecommunications (B.S.I.) 67 Half-wave dipole, a straight aerial symmetrical in regard to its standing-wave current and usually approximately half a wavelength long.
1962 J. H. Simpson & R. S. Richards Physical Princ. Junction Transistors xii. 276 The same is true of any amplifier, such as the Class AB, whose output is asymmetrical and consists of pulses that are larger than one half-wave.
1962 D. R. Corson & P. Lorrain Introd. Electromagn. Fields xiii. 446 After having mastered the electric dipole, we shall be able to study the radiation field of the half~wave antenna—the type commonly used for transmitting radio waves.
half-white n. = half-breed n. 2.
ΚΠ
1866 ‘M. Twain’ Lett. from Hawaii (1967) 26 Foreigners and the better class of natives, and ‘half whites’ in carriages.
1897 ‘M. Twain’ Following Equator 63, I asked after ‘Billy’ Ragsdale, interpreter to the Parliament in my time—a half-white.
1901 Daily Colonist (Victoria, Brit. Columbia) 23 Oct. 8/3 In this boat's crew..was Charlie Diamond... He was a Bonin island half-white and is well known to old time sealers.
half-word n. (also halfword) a group of consecutive bits, which can be handled as a unit, occupying half a word storage unit of a computer.
ΚΠ
1959 J. Jeenel Programming for Digital Computers ii. 60 One might choose a 12-digit word size for the calculator and have a word represent either one number or a pair of instructions. The single-address instructions would be represented by ‘half words’.
1964 Blaauw & Brooks in IBM Systems Jrnl. III. 122 An 8-bit unit of information is fundamental to most of the formats [of the System/360]. A consecutive group of n such units constitutes a field of length n. Fixed-length fields of length one, two, four, and eight are termed bytes, halfwords, words, and double words respectively.
1970 O. Dopping Computers & Data Processing vi. 105 Some machines pack two instructions per cell, and there are different addresses for each half-word, e.g. even addresses for left half-words, odd addresses for right half-words.
half-world n. hemisphere; the demi-monde; also transf.
ΚΠ
a1616 Shakespeare Macbeth (1623) ii. i. 49 Now o're the one halfe World Nature seemes dead. View more context for this quotation
1866 W. D. Howells Venetian Life xvii. 260 The night's whole half-world.
1870 D. J. Kirwan Palace & Hovel xliii. 613 ‘Baby Hamilton’ is another celebrity of the Half-World. Many stories are told about the recklessness of this girl.
1874 Porcupine 21 Feb. 742/1 Those moral magistrates who have so distinctly set their faces against Cremorne and other outdoor haunts of the ‘half-world’.
1881 Daily Tel. 3 Feb. The endless intrigues of the ‘half-world’.
1950 A. Lomax Mister Jelly Roll 185 Linking the folk-jazz half-world to the super-respectable and stuffy world of the music business.
1972 Times 6 Apr. 7/5 Away from his chosen half-world, Munby's social life was passed in the first literary and artistic circles of his day.
3. Parasynthetic, as half-languaged, half-legged, half-lived, half-sensed, half-sighted (hence half-sightedness), half-sleeved, half-souled, half-syllabled, half-tented, half-winged, etc.
ΚΠ
1596 R. Linche Dom Diego in Diella sig. D5v, Halfe-leg'd Buskins curiously ytide with loopes of burnisht gold.
1615 G. Sandys Relation of Journey 3 The men weare halfe-sleeued gownes.
1638 W. Rawley tr. Bacon Hist. Nat. & Exper. Life & Death 42 In the Day-light, they winke, and are but halfe-sighted.
1763 J. Ellis in Philos. Trans. 1762 (Royal Soc.) 52 662 This genus of insects is placed..under the Hemipteræ or half winged.
1833 R. Browning Pauline 167 Like things half-lived, catching and giving life.
1863 N. Hawthorne Our Old Home II. 296 The national half-sightedness.
1865 E. B. Tylor Res. Early Hist. Mankind iv. 76 Half-languaged men.
Draft additions 1993
half-move n. Chess a single move by White or Black (as distinct from a full move, one by each side) made or investigated by a computer program during the course of a game; similarly in chess puzzles; cf. ply n. 1.
ΚΠ
1958 Sci. Amer. June 105/2 Even with much faster computers..it will be impracticable to consider more than about six half-moves ahead.
1973 Sci. Amer. June 93/3 With the computers then available, Shannon thought it would be possible to look ahead four half-moves, or two full moves for each side.
1984 Oxf. Compan. Chess 227/1 A move made by one player is called a single-move and not a half-move, a term used occasionally for trick problems better called puzzles.
1987 C. Ebeling All the Right Moves iv. 71 (caption) The information captured by a register is programmed by connecting the appropriate halfmove inputs to the AND gate governing the enable.
half-port n. a shutter for a gun port (see quot. 1823).
ΚΠ
1823 G. Crabb Universal Technol. Dict. at Ports, Half-ports, a kind of shutters with circular holes in their centre large enough to go over the muzzles of the guns.
This entry has not yet been fully updated (first published 1898; most recently modified version published online September 2016).
<
comb. formc893