glass
see also: Glass
Pronunciation
  • (RP) IPA: /ɡlɑːs/
  • (America) IPA: /ɡlæs/
Noun

glass

  1. (uncountable) An amorphous solid, often transparent substance made by melting sand with a mixture of soda, potash and lime.
    The tabletop is made of glass.
    A popular myth is that window glass is actually an extremely viscous liquid.
  2. (countable) A vessel from which one drinks, especially one made of glass, plastic, or similar translucent or semi-translucent material.
    Fill my glass with milk, please.
  3. (metonymically) The quantity of liquid contained in such a vessel.
    There is half a glass of milk in each pound of chocolate we produce.
    • 1892, Walter Besant, chapter III, in The Ivory Gate: A Novel, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, […], OCLC 16832619 ↗:
      At half-past nine on this Saturday evening, the parlour of the Salutation Inn, High Holborn, contained most of its customary visitors. […] In former days every tavern of repute kept such a room for its own select circle, a club, or society, of habitués, who met every evening, for a pipe and a cheerful glass.
  4. (uncountable) Glassware.
    We collected art glass.
  5. A mirror.
    • 1599, Thomas Dekker, Old Fortunatus, Act III, Scene 1, J.M. Dent & Co., 1904, p. 67,
      […] for what lady can abide to love a spruce silken-face courtier, that stands every morning two or three hours learning how to look by his glass, how to speak by his glass, how to sigh by his glass, how to court his mistress by his glass? I would wish him no other plague, but to have a mistress as brittle as glass.
    She adjusted her lipstick in the glass.
  6. A magnifying glass or telescope.
    • 1912, The Encyclopædia of Sport & Games
      Haviers, or stags which have been gelded when young, have no horns, as is well known, and in the early part of the stalking season, when seen through a glass, might be mistaken for hummels […]
  7. (sport) A barrier made of solid, transparent material.
    1. (basketball, colloquial) The backboard.
      He caught the rebound off the glass.
    2. (ice hockey) The clear, protective screen surrounding a hockey rink.
      He fired the outlet pass off the glass.
  8. A barometer.
  9. (attributive, in names of species) Transparent or translucent.
    glass frog;  glass shrimp;  glass worm
  10. (obsolete) An hourglass.
    • c. 1610–1611, William Shakespeare, “The VVinters Tale”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: Printed by Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, OCLC 606515358 ↗, (please specify the act number in uppercase Roman numerals):
      :
      Were my Wiues Liuer / Infected (as her life) ſhe would not liue / The running of one Glaſſe.
Related terms Translations Translations Verb

glass (glasses, present participle glassing; past and past participle glassed)

  1. (transitive) To fit with glass; to glaze.
  2. (transitive) To enclose in glass.
  3. (transitive) Clipping of fibreglass#English|fibreglass.. To fit, cover, fill, or build, with fibreglass-reinforced resin composite (fiberglass).
  4. (transitive, UK, colloquial) To strike (someone), particularly in the face, with a drinking glass with the intent of causing injury.
    • 1987, John Godber, Bouncers page 19 ↗:
      JUDD. Any trouble last night?
      LES. Usual. Couple of punks got glassed.
    • 2002, Geoff Doherty, A Promoter's Tale page 72 ↗:
      I often mused on what the politicians or authorities would say if they could see for themselves the horrendous consequences of someone who’d been glassed, or viciously assaulted.
    • 2003, Mark Sturdy, Pulp page 139 ↗:
      One night he was in this nightclub in Sheffield and he got glassed by this bloke who’d been just let out of prison that day.
  5. (science fiction) To bombard an area with such intensity (nuclear bomb, fusion bomb, etc) as to melt the landscape into glass.
    • 2012, Halo: First Strike, page 190 ↗:
      “The Covenant don’t ‘miss’ anything when they glass a planet,” the Master Chief replied.
  6. To view through an optical instrument such as binoculars.
  7. (transitive) To smooth or polish (leather, etc.), by rubbing it with a glass burnisher.
  8. (archaic, reflexive) To reflect; to mirror.
    • Happy to glass themselves in such a mirror.
    • Where the Almighty's form glasses itself in tempests.
  9. (transitive) To make glassy.
  10. (intransitive) To become glassy.
    • 2012, Keith Duggan, Cliffs Of Insanity: A Winter On Ireland's Big Waves (page 32)
      Bourez had timed it perfectly: a wind that was forecast for the morning began to stir just after his arrival and the sea glassed off for a brief period before the waves grew bigger and bigger.

Glass
Proper noun
  1. Surname



This text is extracted from the Wiktionary and it is available under the CC BY-SA 3.0 license | Terms and conditions | Privacy policy 0.004
Offline English dictionary