Period

5 definitions found

From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]:

  Period \Pe"ri*od\, n. [L. periodus, Gr. peri`odos a going round,
     a way round, a circumference, a period of time; peri` round,
     about + "odo`s a way: cf. F. p['e]riode.]
     1. A portion of time as limited and determined by some
        recurring or cyclic phenomenon, as by the completion of a
        revolution of one of the heavenly bodies; a division of


        time, as a series of years, months, or days, in which
        something is completed, and ready to recommence and go on
        in the same order; as, the period of the sun, or the
        earth, or a comet; the period of an electromagnetic wave
        is the time interval between maxima.
        [1913 Webster]
  
     2. Hence: A stated and recurring interval of time; more
        generally, an interval of time specified or left
        indefinite; a certain series of years, months, days, or
        the like; a time; a cycle; an age; an epoch; as, the
        period of the Roman republic.
        [1913 Webster]
  
              How by art to make plants more lasting than their
              ordinary period.                      --Bacon.
        [1913 Webster]
  
     3. (Geol.) One of the great divisions of geological time; as,
        the Tertiary period; the Glacial period. See the Chart of
        {Geology}.
        [1913 Webster]
  
     4. The termination or completion of a revolution, cycle,
        series of events, single event, or act; hence, a limit; a
        bound; an end; a conclusion. --Bacon.
        [1913 Webster]
  
              So spake the archangel Michael; then paused,
              As at the world's great period.       --Milton.
        [1913 Webster]
  
              Evils which shall never end till eternity hath a
              period.                               --Jer. Taylor.
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              This is the period of my ambition.    --Shak.
        [1913 Webster]
  
     5. (Rhet.) A complete sentence, from one full stop to
        another; esp., a well-proportioned, harmonious sentence.
        "Devolved his rounded periods." --Tennyson.
        [1913 Webster]
  
              Periods are beautiful when they are not too long.
                                                    --B. Johnson.
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     Note: The period, according to Heyse, is a compound sentence
           consisting of a protasis and apodosis; according to
           Becker, it is the appropriate form for the coordinate
           propositions related by antithesis or causality.
           --Gibbs.
           [1913 Webster]
  
     6. (Print.) The punctuation point [.] that marks the end of a
        complete sentence, or of an abbreviated word.
        [1913 Webster]
  
     7. (Math.) One of several similar sets of figures or terms
        usually marked by points or commas placed at regular
        intervals, as in numeration, in the extraction of roots,
        and in circulating decimals.
        [1913 Webster]
  
     8. (Med.) The time of the exacerbation and remission of a
        disease, or of the paroxysm and intermission.
        [1913 Webster]
  
     9. (Mus.) A complete musical sentence.
        [1913 Webster]
  
     10. (Sports) One of the specified time intervals into which a
         game is divided; as, there are three periods in a hockey
         game.
         [PJC]
  
     11. (Education) One of the specified time intervals into
         which the academic day is divided; as, my calculus class
         is in the first period.
         [PJC]
  
     12. The time interval during which a woman is menstruating,
         or the event of a single menstruation; as, her period was
         late this month.
         [PJC]
  
     {The period}, the present or current time, as distinguished
        from all other times.
        [1913 Webster]
  
     Syn: Time; date; epoch; era; age; duration; limit; bound;
          end; conclusion; determination.
          [1913 Webster]

From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]:

  Period \Pe"ri*od\ (p[=e]"r[i^]*[u^]d), v. t.
     To put an end to. [Obs.] --Shak.
     [1913 Webster]

From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]:

  Period \Pe"ri*od\, v. i.
     To come to a period; to conclude. [Obs.] "You may period upon
     this, that," etc. --Felthman.
     [1913 Webster]

From WordNet (r) 2.0 [wn]:

  period
       n 1: an amount of time; "a time period of 30 years"; "hastened
            the period of time of his recovery"; "Picasso's blue
            period" [syn: {time period}, {period of time}]
       2: one of three periods of play in hockey games
       3: a stage in the history of a culture having a definable place
          in space and time; "a novel from the Victorian period"
          [syn: {historic period}, {historical period}]
       4: the interval taken to complete one cycle of a regularly
          repeating phenomenon
       5: the monthly discharge of blood from the uterus of
          nonpregnant women from puberty to menopause; "the women
          were sickly and subject to excessive menstruation"; "a
          woman does not take the gout unless her menses be
          stopped"--Hippocrates; "the semen begins to appear in
          males and to be emitted at the same time of life that the
          catamenia begin to flow in females"--Aristotle [syn: {menstruation},
           {menses}, {menstruum}, {catamenia}, {flow}]
       6: a punctuation mark (.) placed at the end of a declarative
          sentence to indicate a full stop or after abbreviations;
          "in England they call a period a stop" [syn: {point}, {full
          stop}, {stop}, {full point}]
       7: a unit of geological time during which a system of rocks
          formed; "ganoid fishes swarmed during the earlier
          geological periods" [syn: {geological period}]
       8: the end or completion of something; "death put a period to
          his endeavors"; "a change soon put a period to my
          tranquility"

From Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0 [moby-thes]:

  389 Moby Thesaurus words for "period":
     Alexandrine, Archean, Archeozoic, Cambrian, Carboniferous,
     Cenozoic, Comanchean, Cretaceous, Devonian, Eocene, Glacial,
     Holocene, Lower Cretaceous, Lower Tertiary, Mesozoic, Miocene,
     Mississippian, Oligocene, Paleocene, Paleozoic, Pennsylvanian,
     Permian, Pleistocene, Pliocene, Precambrian, Proterozoic,
     Quaternary, Recent, Silurian, Tertiary, Triassic, Upper Cretaceous,
     Upper Tertiary, Z, accent, accentuation, adjectival phrase, aeon,
     age, amount, amphibrach, amphimacer, amplitude, anacrusis, anapest,
     annual period, antinode, antispast, aphelion, apodosis, apogee,
     arsis, astronomical longitude, autumnal equinox, bacchius,
     baseball season, basketball season, bass passage, beat, boundary,
     bourdon, bridge, burden, cadence, caesura, caliber, catalexis,
     catamenia, catamenial discharge, catastrophe, ceasing,
     celestial equator, celestial longitude, celestial meridian,
     cessation, chloriamb, chloriambus, chorus, chronology, circle,
     clause, close, closing, closure, coda, cold season, colon, colures,
     comma, compass, concert season, conclusion, construction,
     consummation, continuity, counterpoint, courses, crack of doom,
     crest, cretic, culmination, curtain, curtains, cut, dactyl, days,
     de Broglie wave, death, decease, degree, denouement, destination,
     destiny, development, diaeresis, diffraction, dimeter, dipody,
     discontinuance, division, dochmiac, doom, dry season, duration,
     duree, ecliptic, effect, electromagnetic wave, elegiac,
     elegiac couplet, elegiac pentameter, emphasis, end, end point,
     ending, envoi, epilogue, epitrite, epoch, equator, equinoctial,
     equinoctial circle, equinoctial colure, equinox, era, eschatology,
     expiration, exposition, expression, extent, fate, feminine caesura,
     figure, final solution, final twitch, final words, finale,
     finality, finis, finish, flowers, folderol, foot, football season,
     frequency, frequency band, frequency spectrum, full stop,
     galactic longitude, geocentric longitude, geodetic longitude, goal,
     grade, great circle, guided wave, harmonic close, headed group,
     height, heliocentric longitude, heptameter, heptapody,
     heroic couplet, hexameter, hexapody, iamb, iambic,
     iambic pentameter, ictus, idiom, idiotism, in phase, interference,
     interlude, intermezzo, interval, introductory phrase, ionic,
     izzard, jingle, juncture, last, last breath, last gasp,
     last things, last trumpet, last words, lastingness, latter end,
     leap, level, light, lilt, locution, longitude, longitudinal wave,
     manner of speaking, mark, masculine caesura, measure,
     mechanical wave, menses, menstrual discharge, menstruation,
     meridian, meter, metrical accent, metrical foot, metrical group,
     metrical unit, metron, molossus, monthlies, mora, movement,
     musical phrase, musical sentence, node, notch, noun phrase, nuance,
     numbers, off season, omega, orbit, ornament, out of phase, paeon,
     paragraph, part, pas, passage, patch, pause, payoff,
     peculiar expression, peg, pentameter, pentapody, perigee,
     perihelion, periodic wave, periodicity, periods, peroration,
     phrasal idiom, phrase, pitch, plane, plateau, point,
     proceleusmatic, proportion, psychological time, pyrrhic, quantity,
     quietus, radio wave, rainy season, range, ratio, ray, reach,
     refrain, reinforcement, remove, resolution, resonance,
     resonance frequency, response, resting place, rhythm, ritornello,
     round, rung, scale, scope, season, seasonableness, seasonality,
     section, seismic wave, semicolon, sentence, set phrase, shade,
     shadow, shock wave, small circle, social season, solstitial colure,
     sound wave, space, space-time, span, spell, spondee, sprung rhythm,
     stair, standard, standard phrase, stanza, statement, step, stint,
     stop, stoppage, stopping place, strain, stress, stretch,
     surface wave, swan song, swing, syntactic structure, syzygy,
     tailpiece, tense, term, terminal, termination, terminus,
     tetrameter, tetrapody, tetraseme, that time, the curse, the future,
     the past, the present, the season, thesis, tidal wave, tide, time,
     time of year, timebinding, trajectory, transverse wave, tread,
     tribrach, trimeter, tripody, triseme, trochee, trough,
     turn of expression, turn of phrase, tutti, tutti passage, usage,
     utterance, variation, verb complex, verb phrase, verbalism,
     vernal equinox, verse, wave, wave equation, wave motion,
     wave number, wavelength, way of speaking, while, windup,
     word-group, years, zodiac, zone