n.
- a length or portion of time.
▸a major division of geological time that is a subdivision of an era and is itself subdivided into epochs.
- each of the set divisions of the day in a school.
-
(also menstrual period)
a monthly flow of blood and other material from the lining of the uterus, occurring in women of childbearing age when not pregnant.
- N. Amer. a full stop.
- Physics the interval of time between successive occurrences of the same state in an oscillatory or cyclic phenomenon.
- Mathematics the interval between successive equal values of a periodic function.
- Chemistry a set of elements occupying a horizontal row in the periodic table.
- Astronomy the time taken by a celestial object to rotate about its axis, or to make one circuit of its orbit.
- Rhetoric a complex sentence, especially one consisting of several clauses, constructed as part of a formal speech or oration.
adj.
belonging to or characteristic in style of a past historical time:
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period furniture.
Derivative
- periodization
or periodisation n. - periodize
or periodise v.
Etymology
ME: from OFr. periode, via L. from Gk periodos ‘orbit, recurrence, course’.
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