Half
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Etymology
Anglo Saxon healf, half, half; as a noun, half, side, part; akin to Old Saxon, Old Friesian, and Dutch half, German halb, Swedish half, Danish halv, Icelandic hālfr, Gothic 𐌷𐌰𐌻𐌱𐍃 (halbs). Compare halve, behalf
Adjective
- Consisting of a moiety, or half; as, a half bushel; a half hour; a half dollar; a half view
- Note: The adjective and noun are often united to form a compound.
- Consisting of some indefinite portion resembling a half; approximately a half, whether more or less; partial; imperfect; as, a half dream; half knowledge.
- Quotations
- Assumed from thence a half consent. - Tennyson
- Quotations
Derived expressions
- Half ape, (Zoölogy): a lemur
- Half back, (Football): See under 2d back
- Half bent: the first notch, for the sear point to enter, in the tumbler of a gunlock; the halfcock notch
- Half binding: a style of bookbinding in which only the back and corners are in leather
- Half boarder: one who boards in part; specifically, a scholar at a boarding school who takes dinner only
- Half-breadth plan, (Shipbuilding): a horizontal plan of the half a vessel, divided lengthwise, showing the lines
- Half cadence, (Music): a cadence on the dominant
- Half cap, (Obsolete): a slight salute with the cap. - Shakespeare
- A half cock: the position of the cock of a gun when retained by the first notch
- half cocked: or halfcocked: unprepared, lacking forethought; -- as in go off half cocked
- Half hitch: a sailor's knot in a rope; half of a clove hitch
- Half hose: short stockings; socks
- Half measure: an imperfect or weak line of action
- Half note, (Music): a minim, one half of a semibreve
- Half page half of a single page, of a book.
- Half pay: half of the wages or salary; reduced pay; as, an officer on half pay
- Half price: half the ordinary price; or a price much reduced
- Half round
- (Architecture): A molding of semicircular section
- (Mechanical): Having one side flat and the other rounded; -- said of a file
- Half shift, (Music); a position of the hand, between the open position and the first shift, in playing on the violin and kindred instruments. See shift
- Half step, (Music): a semitone; the smallest difference of pitch or interval, used in music
- Half tide: the time or state of the tide equally distant from ebb and flood
- Half time: half the ordinary time for work or attendance; as, the half-time system
- Half tint, (Fine Arts): a middle or intermediate tint, as in drawing or painting. See demitint
- Half truth: a statement only partially true, or which gives only a part of the truth. - Mrs. Browning
- Half year, the space of six months; one term of a school when there are two terms in a year.
Adverb
- In an equal part or degree; in some pa appromating a half; partially; imperfectly; as, half-colored, half done, half-hearted, half persuaded, half conscious.
- Quotations
- Half loth and half consenting. - Dryden
- Their children spoke half in the speech of Ashdod. - Nehemiah 13:24
- Quotations
Noun
Plural: halves
- (Obsolete): Part; side; behalf - Wyclif
- Quotations
- The four halves of the house - Chaucer
- Quotations
- One of two equal parts into which anything may be divided, or considered as divided; -- sometimes followed by of; as, a half of an apple.
- Quotations
- Not half his riches known, and yet despised. - Milton
- A friendship so complete Portioned in halves between us - Tennyson
- Quotations
Derived expressions
- Better half. See under better
- In half, in two; (Colloquial): an expression sometimes used improperly instead of in or into halves; as, to cut in half. - Dickens
- (Obsolete): In, or on, one's half: in one's behalf; on one's part
- To cry halves, to claim an equal share with another
- To go halves, to share equally between two.
Transitive verb
- (Obsolete): To halve. - Sir H. Wotton
