▪ I. period, n.
(ˈpɪərɪəd)
Forms: 5 peryod, paryode, 6 peryode, periode, 6– period: see also parody n.2
[a. F. période (14th c. in Hatz-Darm.) = Sp. per{iacu}odo, It. periodo, ad. L. period-us, a. Gr. περίοδος going round, way round, circuit, revolution, cycle of years, periodic recurrence, course, recurring fit of disease, orbit of a heavenly body, rounded sentence, f. περί around + ὁδός way; in ancient L. used only of the period or cycle of the four Grecian games, and of a complete sentence; in med.L. in other of the Gr. senses.]
I. A course or extent of time.
† 1. The time during which anything runs its course; time of duration. Obs.
| 1413 Pilgr. Sowle (Caxton 1483) iv. xxvi. 72 For the tyme and paryode bifore ordeyned of the first maker. 1614 Raleigh Hist. World v. iii. §13. 424 Unto all Dominions God hath set their periods. 1626 Bacon Sylva §587 How by Art to make Plants more lasting than their ordinary Period. 1672 Sir T. Browne Let. Friend §11 Many Temples early gray have out-lived the Psalmist's period. |
2. a. Chronol. A round of time or series of years, marked by the recurrence of astronomical coincidences (e.g. the changes of the moon falling on the same days of the solar year), used as a unit in chronology; e.g. the Callippic, Dionysian, Julian, Metonic period. Cf. cycle n. 2.
| 1613 [see Julian]. 1694 Holder Disc. Time (J.), A cycle or period is an account of years that has a beginning and an end too, and then begins again as often as it ends. 1696–1876 [see Callippic]. 1704 J. Harris Lex. Techn. I, Period, in Chronology, signifies a Revolution of a certain Number of Years; as the Metonick Period, the Julian Period, and the Calippick Period. 1718 Prideaux Connect. O. & N. Test. ii. iv. 231 In the language of Chronologers a Cycle is a round of several years and a Period a round of several Cycles. 1727–1876 [see Dionysian 3]. |
b. Astron. The time in which a planet or satellite performs its revolution about its primary.
| 1727–41 Chambers Cycl. s.v., The periods of the comets are now many of them pretty well ascertained. 1741 Watts Improv. Mind i. xvi. §2 Tell these persons..that the earth, with all the planets, roll round the sun in their several periods. 1834 Nat. Philos., Astron. iii. 69/1 (Usef. Knowl. Soc.) Her time of being again in the same direction with the sun, is called her synodic period, or synodic revolution. Ibid. 70/2 Her return to the same position with respect to the equinox, or her tropical period, will be shorter. 1854 Brewster More Worlds ii. 29 Its [Uranus'] year, or annual period, is eighty-four years. |
† c. Physiol. period of the blood: see quot.
| 1727–41 Chambers Cycl. s.v., Period of the blood,..the circle of the blood, or the tour it makes round the body, for the support of life. |
d. Physics. The interval of time between the recurrence of phases in a vibration, etc.
| 1865 Tyndall Radiation xv. 52 The rays of light differ from those of invisible heat only in point of period. 1869 ― in Fortn. Rev. Feb. 230 The energy transmitted to the eye from a candle-flame half a mile distant is more than sufficient to inform consciousness; while waves of a different period, possessing many times this energy have no effect whatever. 1879 Thomson & Tait Nat. Phil. I. i. §54 The Period of a simple harmonic motion is the time which elapses from any instant until the moving point again moves in the same direction through the same position. |
e. Any round or portion of time occupied by a recurring process or action, or marked by the regular recurrence of a phenomenon.
| 1850 M{supc}Cosh Div. Govt. ii. i. (1874) 133 The tides of the ocean..flow in periods. 1862 Tyndall Mountaineeer. xi, The heart beats by periods. 1902 Westm. Gaz. 19 Aug. 8/1 This hypothesis is in full accord with the ‘climate-period of thirty-five years’ recently put forward by Professor Brückner. |
3. a. Path. The time during which a disease runs its course; that occupied by each attack of intermittent fever from its accession to its remission; also, each of the temporal phases distinguishable in the course of a disease.
| 1543 Traheron Vigo's Chirurg. 50/2 Optalmia hath certaine paroxysmes or fyttes, and periodes or courses. 1726 Quincy Lex. Phys.-Med. (ed. 3), Period is the Space in which a Distemper continues from its Beginning to its Declension; and such as return after a certain Space, with like Symptoms, are called Periodical Distempers. 1893 Syd. Soc. Lex., Period,..the time during which a disease progresses from its accession to its declension; also, those marked changes that characterize the progress of a disease, of which there are said to be five,—the invasion, the augment, the state, or full development, the decline, and the termination. Ibid., The term period was also applied to the time between two attacks of intermittent fever. It was divided into two parts, the accession..and the remission. |
b. sing. and pl. Menses, catamenia. Also monthly period(s) and attrib.
| 1822–34 Good's Study Med. (ed. 4) IV. 121 The exact day between any two periods of menstruation in which semination has taken effect. 1879 St. George's Hosp. Rep. IX. 777 Her habit is for the periods to recur every five weeks, rather freely. 1891 I. Ellis Essentials of Conception 28 (Advt.), Ladies' ‘period’ towels. 1893 Syd. Soc. Lex., Periods. 1922 Joyce Ulysses 368 Some women for instance warn you off when they have their period. 1939 M. Spring Rice Working-Class Wives vi. 145 She suffers from ‘period pains’. 1953 H. Miller Plexus (1963) iii. 112 Between times I wondered what was eating her. Maybe her period coming on. 1956 R. M. Lester Towards Hereafter x. 123 In January 1952 I missed a period and with high hopes I went to see my G.P. and told him the glad news. 1970 G. Greer Female Eunuch 52 The genteel..‘I've got my period’. 1976 W. H. Canaway Willow-Pattern War xv. 156 She'd cried off at the last minute with a period pain. |
4. a. An indefinite portion of time, spec. of history, or of some continuous process, as life (generic or individual), distinguished and characterized by the same prevalent features or conditions.
| 1712 Addison Hymn, ‘When all thy Mercies’ xi, Through every Period of my Life Thy Goodness I'll pursue. 1780 Burke Sp. at Bristol Wks. III. 383 The Reformation, one of the greatest periods of human improvement, was a time of trouble and confusion. 1809–10 Coleridge Friend (1865) 116 We have most of us, at some period or other of our lives, been amused with dialogues of the dead. 1865–6 H. Phillips Amer. Paper Curr. II. 148 The winter periods proved always trying to the American cause. 1870 Max Müller Sc. Relig. (1873) 66 Niobe was, in a former period of language, a name of snow and winter. |
b. Geol. One of the larger divisions of geological time; usually subordinate to an era: see epoch 5 c.
| 1833 Lyell Princ. Geol. III. 54 The period next antecedent we shall call Eocene. 1853 Phillips Rivers Yorksh. iv. 124 All Holderness was a sea-bed in the ‘glacial’ period. 1863 [see cretaceous 2]. 1895 Funk's Stand. Dict. s.v., In the scheme of nomenclature proposed by the International Geological Congress period is the chronological term of the second order, to which system is the corresponding stratigraphic term; as, Silurian period or system. |
c. Any specified portion or division of time; spec. (a) a portion of an artist's life characterized by a particular style; (b) freq. with poss. adj.: the particular historical or cultural portion of time with which one is concerned.
| a 1751 Bolingbroke Stud. Hist. (1752) I. vi. 236 The particular periods into which the whole period should be divided. 1793 Burke Corr. (1844) IV. 141 Twenty years would be too long a period to fix for such an event. 1818 Cruise Digest (ed. 2) III. 499 Where a person acquires a second right, he is allowed a new period of twenty years to pursue his remedy. 1855 Milman Lat. Chr. xi. viii, The termination of a centenary period in the history of man. 1865 Swinburne Anactoria 302 Till time wax faint in all his periods. 1891 O. Wilde Pict. Dorian Gray xix. 319 What has become of that wonderful portrait he did of you?.. It belonged to Basil's best period. 1921 W. S. Maugham Circle i. 13, I want you to look at this chair I've just got... About 1750, I should say... It's exactly my period. 1925 R. Fry Let. 1 May (1972) II. 568 Lady Cunard..wanted a Picasso of the blue period. 1952 ‘W. Cooper’ Struggles of Albert Woods ii. iv. 100, I hardly know Picasso's rose period from his blue. 1958 M. Kelly Christmas Egg i. 29 He had been at a loss for the date of the battle of Agincourt, and had excused himself with the plea that it was outside his period. a 1966 M. Allingham Cargo of Eagles (1968) i. 16 I'm certain there's an early fortress..just waiting to be uncovered... That's not my period and so is not my province. 1973 M. Mackintosh King & Two Queens ii. 27 The Picasso Museum..has very good examples of his pink and blue periods? 1978 J. Hansen Man Everybody was Afraid Of xii. 93 She handed Dave one of the mugs. ‘From my potting period.’ |
d. the period: the time in question or under consideration; esp. the present day: cf. day n. 13 b (b). Also out of period: anachronistic.
| 1859 A. J. Munby Diary 19 July in D. Hudson Munby (1972) 39 An Englishman of the period, smoking a cigar; his dress is ‘civilized’—he wears gloves. 1868 Mrs. E. Lynn Linton in Sat. Rev. 14 Mar. 340/1 The girl of the period is a creature who dyes her hair and paints her face. 1871 M. Collins Mrq. & Merch. II. i. 2 Some of them grow ‘fast’, and ‘loud’—mere ‘girls of the period’. 1902 G. B. Shaw Mrs. Warren's Profession Pref. p. xv, Both plots conform to the strictest rules of the period. 1933 E. O'Neill Ah, Wilderness! i. 15 Scene—Sitting room of the Miller home in a large small-town in Connecticut—about 7:30 in the morning of July 4th, 1906. The room is..furnished with the scrupulous medium-priced tastelessness of the period. 1961 C. Willock Death in Covert iii. 66 A serving-wench..asked him: ‘Sack, mulled claret, or Madeira?’ Mr Goss felt that two at least of these were out of period. 1969 Y. Carter Mr. Campion's Farthing ii. 15, I hate getting out of period but sometimes one has to be modern. 1976 Listener 20 May 647/4 Wesley..had the imaginative and technical powers to transcend the humdrum idiom of so much church music of the period without, at the same time, discarding its essential nature. |
e. Educ. A portion of time set aside for a lesson or other activity; cf. free period s.v. free a. D. 2.
| 1876 C. M. Yonge Womankind xiii. 92 Most people's breakfast hour coincides with this only period permitted [in National Schools] for religious teaching. 1930 Times Educ. Suppl. 18 Jan. 21/2 The pupil has five periods a week..for French. 1948 ‘N. Shute’ No Highway vi. 167 ‘What about the school?’ ‘I've only got one period to⁓morrow.’ 1955 E. Blishen Roaring Boys i. 30, I had an odd period of history with one of the first-year classes. 1966 J. Partridge Middle School i. 24 Nearly every class has a ‘library period’. 1974 H. L. Foster Ribbin' i. 8 Hey, Teach, we work a period, read comics a period, and then take off the last period—OK? |
f. One of the intervals into which the playing time of a sporting fixture is divided.
| 1898 Encycl. Sport II. 128/2 The duration of play in a match shall be one hour, divided into three periods of twenty minutes. 1935 Encycl. Sports 359/2 Two time⁓keepers..inform the referee..that the end of each period or rest has arrived. 1968 Globe & Mail (Toronto) 5 Feb. 17/2 Pit Martin also scored for a three-goal first period for Chicago and Wayne Maki tallied early in the second. 1974 State (Columbia, S. Carolina) 3 Mar. 1-D/1 The Paladins opened 11-point leads on three occasions in the final period. |
II. Completion, end of any course.
5. a. The point of completion of any round of time or course of action or duration; consummation, termination, conclusion, end. Phrases: to put († give, set) a period to, † bring, come to a period; † to set down one's (or the) period (perh. with some allusion to 11 b). Now arch.
| [c 1374, 1430–40: see parody n.2] 1590 Greene Mourn. Garm. Wks. (Grosart) IX. 150 She glaunced her lookes on all,..but at last she set downe her period on the face of Alexis, thinking he was the fairest. 1591 Shakes. 1 Hen. VI, iv. ii. 17 The period of thy Tyranny approacheth. 1599 B. Jonson Cynthia's Rev. v. iii, To end And give a timely period to our sports. 1601 R. Johnson Kingd. & Commw. Ded., I put a period to these lines. a 1636 Lynde Case for Spectacles (1638) Ep. Ded., Death..sets a period to all suits in Courts. 1647 Clarendon Hist. Reb. vii. §391 This Answer was return'd to his Majesty; which put a period to all Men's hopes. 1670 Evelyn Let. Ld. Treasurer 20 Jan. in Diary, The subiect of it being..y⊇ warr..not yet brought to a period. 1705 Stanhope Paraphr. I. 140 A thing past and now come to a Period. 1734 Watts Reliq. Juv. (1789) 86 Let us hold the period of life ever in our view. 1750 Johnson Rambler No. 54 ¶2 A man accustomed..to trace things from their origin to their period. 1814 Cary Dante, Paradise xvi. 137 The just anger that hath..put a period to your gladsome days. 1882 Stevenson New Arab. Nts. (1884) 96, I mean to put a period to this prodigality. |
† b. The final stage of any process or course of action; the concluding sentence, peroration; the finish, consummation, final event, issue, outcome.
| c 1530 L. Cox Rhet. (1899) 66 The periode or conclusion standethe in the bryefe enumeracyon of thynges spoken before, and in mouynge the affectyons. 1581 J. Bell Haddon's Answ. Osor. 404 Mystres money made upp alwayes the peryode of the play. 1616 W. Forde Serm. 64 So shall it be the period and end of my discourse. 1713 Addison Cato i. iii, O think what anxious moments pass between The birth of plots, and their last fatal periods. 1769 Robertson Chas. V, vii. III. 28 Conducting the deliberations..to such a successful period. |
† c. An end to part of a course; a stop. Obs. rare.
| 1590 Marlowe 2nd Pt. Tamburl. i. iii, Yet shall my soldiers make no period Until Natolia kneel before your feet. 1634 Sir T. Herbert Trav. 101 All terrene joyes are mixt with discontent and periods. |
† d. Death. Obs. rare.
| a 1639 Wotton Parallel Essex & Buckhm. in Reliq. (1651) 34 Touching the Dukes [Buckingham's] suddain period. 1682 Sir T. Browne Chr. Mor. ii. §11 The Tragical Exits and unexpected periods of some eminent Persons. |
† 6. The highest point reached in any course; the acme. Obs.
| 1595 Markham Sir R. Grinvile (Arb.) 78 Since last the sunne Lookt from the hiest period of the sky. 1604 E. G[rimstone] D'Acosta's Hist. Indies ii. vii. 98 When the sunne is in the period of his force in the burning Zone. 1606 Shakes. Ant. & Cl. iv. xiv. 107. 1608 D. T[uvil] Ess. Pol. & Mor. 43 b, Nor was the massacre of this his warlike sonne the period of his furie. |
† 7. A particular point in the course of anything; a point or stage of advance; a point of time, moment, occasion. Obs.
| 1600 W. Watson Decacordon (1602) 341 If you aske of the Mathematician, how to passe betwixt two periods, he will tell you that [etc.]. 1664 Butler Hud. ii. ii. 657 At fit Periods the whole Rout Set up their throats with Clam'rous shout. c 1790 J. Imison Sch. Art II. 82 Farenheit's scale is most generally in use, and the remarkable periods of heat are as follows: 212 water boils, 175 spirits of wine boils, 112 fever-heat, 98 blood-heat [etc.]. 1793 Smeaton Edystone L. §281 note, The work being now brought to such a period that it could go on with less interruption. |
† 8. A limit in space, appointed end (of a journey or course). Obs.
| 1605 Willet Hexapla Gen. 463, 50 miles beyond..which was the vtmost period of their journey. 1633 Bp. Hall Hard Texts Ezek. i. 17 They moued all four together and went right on to the period appointed. 1789 in Burke's Corr. (1844) III. 87 Our best friends will not march, unless they can perceive a period to their journey. |
† 9. fig. The end to be attained, the goal. Obs.
| 1586 Marlowe 1st Pt. Tamburl. v. ii, If these had made one poem's period. 1598 Shakes. Merry W. iii. iii. 47 This is the period of my ambition. Ibid. iv. ii. 237. 1613 ― Hen. VIII, i. ii. 209 There's his period To sheath his knife in vs. 1618 M. Baret Horsemanship, Cures 18 When you haue gotten the period of your desire. 1643 Milton Divorce Pref. (1851) 18 This therefore shall be task and period of this discourse. a 1674 Clarendon Surv. Leviath. xxx. (1676) 184 Which without doubt must be the natural and final period of all his Prescriptions in Policy and Government. |
III. In Grammar, Rhetoric, Music, etc.
10. a. A complete sentence. (Cf. Aristotle Rhet. iii. ix.) Usually applied to a sentence consisting of several clauses, grammatically connected, and rhetorically constructed. Hence, in pl., rhetorical or grammatical language.
| [1533 More Apol. xiv. 103 b, A very colde skuse to a man lerned that wyll way the hole periodus togyther.] 1579 E. K. in Spenser's Sheph. Kal. Ep. to Harvey, The whole Periode and compasse of speache so delightsome for the roundnesse, and so graue for the straungenesse. 1593 Nashe Four Lett. Confut. 82, I know two seuerall periods or full pointes in this last epistle, at least fortie lines long a piece. 1634 Milton Comus 585 Not a period Shall be unsaid for me. 1675 Temple Let. to King Wks. 1731 II. 330 He went on, and read a long Period in Cypher. 1764 Gray Corr. N. Nicholls 19 Nov., If you will not take this as an excuse, accept it at least as a well-turned period, which is always my principal concern. 1782 Cowper Table T. 517 If sentiment were sacrificed to sound, And truth cut short to make a period round. 1869 Huxley in Sci. Opin. 21 Apr. 464 Those oddly constructed periods which seem to have prejudiced many persons against reading his works. 1875 Whitney Life Lang. x. 209 To put clauses together into periods. |
b. In Ancient Prosody, A group of two or more cola (colon2 1); a metrical group or series of dicolic, tricolic, etc. verses.
| 1837–9 Hallam Hist. Lit. i. ii. §6 He was the first..who replaced the rude structure of periods by some degree of rhythm. 1882 Blades Caxton 126 The Greek grammarians..called a complete sentence a period, a limb was a colon, and a clause a comma. 1883 [see colon2 1]. |
11. a. A full pause such as is properly made at the end of a sentence.
| 1587 Greene Penelopes Web Wks. (Grosart) V. 151 She fell into consideration with her selfe that the longest Sommer hath his Autumne, the largest sentence his Period. [1589 Puttenham Eng. Poesie ii. iv. (Arb.) 88 The third they called periodus, for a complement or full pause, and as a resting place and perfection of so much former speach as had bene vttered.] Ibid. 89 Much more might be sayd for the vse of your three pauses, comma, colon, and periode. 1590 Shakes. Mids. N. v. i. 96 Make periods in the midst of sentences. 1593 ― Lucr. 565 She puts the period often from his place. a 1637 B. Jonson Eng. Gram. ii. ix, The distinction of a perfect sentence hath a more full stay, and doth rest the spirit, which is a pause or a period. |
b. The point or character that marks the end of a complete sentence; a full stop (.). Also added to a statement to emphasize a place where there is or should be a full stop, freq. (colloq.) with the implication ‘and that is all there is to say about it’, ‘and it is as simple as that’.
| 1609 J. Davies Holy Roode (1878) 20/2 No Commaes but thy Stripes; no Periods But thy Nailes. 1612 Brinsley Lud. Lit. 95 In reading, that he [the scholar] doe it distinctly, reading to a Period or full point, and there to stay. 1748 J. Mason Elocut. 24 A Comma stops the Voice while we may privately tell one, a Semi-colon two; a Colon three: and a Period four. 1824 L. Murray Eng. Gram. (ed. 5) I. 405 When a sentence is complete and independent..it is marked with a Period. 1866 Mason Eng. Gram. (ed. 7) 121 Punctuation..4 The Full stop or Period. 1934 J. O'Hara Appointment in Samarra (1935) viii. 248 ‘An unscrupulous woman can make a man— ’ ‘Period.’ 1946 Sun (Baltimore) 2 Oct. 8 (Advt.), A cigarette is supposed to give you pleasure. Period. 1947 Mind LVI. 65 The empirical evidence suggests the generalisation and supports it. If it does, it does. Period. 1948 H. Lawrence Death of Doll i. 21 ‘Lucky Monny to have her own pocket.’ ‘Stop that. Lucky Monny, period.’ 1951 C. Armstrong Black-Eyed Stranger (1952) xvii. 150, I don't want to think you are a romantic young thing, period. 1956 J. L. Austin in Proc. Brit. Acad. XLII. 113 It does not follow either that ‘I panted whether or not I ran’ or that ‘I panted’ period. 1958 Rice & ‘McBain’ April Robin Murders (1959) xxii. 245 But Browne doesn't care... He wants the money, period. 1960 ‘M. Cronin’ Begin with Gun xii. 141 ‘You know how nosy I am about unsolved crimes.’ ‘Nosy. Period.’ 1964 V. Nabokov Defence x. 156, I can't abandon him. And I won't. Period. 1972 Science 12 May 638/1 Don't know, but we have exceeded it: 7. Don't know, period: 10. 1974 H. L. Foster Ribbin' vi. 285 It is wrong for any teacher to have an affair with a student, period. 1976 Shooting Times & Country Mag. 16–22 Dec. 18/1 So far as the Spey was concerned this year, however, the fish did not arrive—period! 1977 Language LIII. 409 If this is the view R got from ‘On generative semantics’, he is illiterate, period. |
12. Mus. ‘A complete musical sentence’ (Stainer & Barrett 1898).
| 1866 Engel Nat. Mus. iii. 83 A period, however, does not necessarily always embrace eight bars. 1880 C. H. H. Parry in Grove Dict. Mus. II. 692 A Period is one of the divisions which characterise the form of musical works..the lesser divisions are phrases. |
13. Arith. A set of figures in a large number marked off by commas placed between or dots placed over, as in numeration, circulating decimals, and the extraction of the square or cube root.
| 1674 S. Jeake Arith. (1696) 15 A Period is a comprehension of Degrees..as 123..12345, &c. a 1677 Cocker's Arith. i. §10. 6 A Period..when a Number consists of more than three figures or places, whose proper order is to prick or distinguish every third Place..so.. 63.452. 1690 Leybourn Curs. Math. 4 Numbers..of Three Figures, or Places..may properly be called a Period. 1704 J. Harris Lex. Techn. I. s.v., A Period in Numbers, is a Distinction made by a Point, or Comma after every sixth Place or Figure; and is used in Numeration, for the readier distinguishing and naming the several Figures or Places. 1859 Barn. Smith Arith. & Algebra (ed. 6) 76 The part [of a circulating decimal] which is repeated is called the Period. |
14. Math. The interval between any two successive equal values of a periodic function, i.e. one whose values recur in the same order while that of the variable increases or decreases continually.
| 1879 Cayley Coll. Math. Papers X. 468 The theta-functions have the quarter-periods (1, 1), the half-periods (2, 2), and the whole periods (4, 4). 1882 Minchin Unipl. Kinemat. 13 If ϕ (x + nλ) = ϕ (x),..n being any integer and λ a constant, ϕ (x) is a periodic function of x, its period being λ. |
15. Chem. A horizontal row in the periodic table of the elements; the set of elements occupying such a row, usu. comprising an alkali metal and those elements of greater atomic number up to and including the next noble gas. Cf. group n. 3 c (ii).
| 1879 Chem. News 5 Dec. 268/1 In the first [table] the elements are placed in large periods, with their atomic weights. In the second they are arranged in groups and series, that is to say, in small periods, in such a manner that the differences between the odd and even series become very apparent. Ibid. 19 Dec. 291/1 We see..that the members at the beginning of the large periods (as well as the small periods commencing with Na and Li) are metals of a very strongly pronounced alkaline nature. 1946 [see lanthanide 1]. 1965 Phillips & Williams Inorg. Chem. I. ii. 40 (caption) The series of elements from Li to Ne will be referred to as the first row or the first short period, and similarly the series Rb to Xe as the fourth row or the second long period. 1974 D. M. Adams Inorg. Solids ii. 37 Across each period of the Periodic Table, ionic radii decrease with increasing charge and atomic number. |
IV. 16. a. attrib. or as adj. in sense ‘belonging to, characteristic, imitative, or representative of, a particular (past) period’ esp. in style or design in architecture, dress, furniture, literature, etc.
Freq. in inexact or euphemistic use.
| 1905 (title) Borgia: a period play. 1906 G. Kobbé How to appreciate Music 47 A pianoforte has no business in a ‘period’ room. If the person is rich enough to afford ‘period’ rooms, he also can afford a music room. 1908 Westm. Gaz. 17 Dec. 4/1 Some of them..may be said to be striving to create a ‘period’ type of carriage for themselves. 1914 Eberlein & McClure (title) The practical book of period furniture. 1920 W. R. Lethaby in Form in Civilization (1922) 12 That which now professes to be designed in a style, or, as the still more disgusting slang runs, to be ‘period work’, has not the essence of life. 1925 in F. Madan Oxford outside Guide-Bks. (ed. 2) 202 (Advt.), Write for new illustrated Catalogue containing fullest particulars of Minty Bookcases, including various ‘period’ styles at moderate prices. 1927 Times 28 Oct. 17/3 The bride..wore a period gown of cream chiffon velvet, trimmed with seed pearls. 1928 Daily Sketch 2 Aug. 15 (caption) ‘Period’ pages... The little pages wore replicas of the old-time uniform of the Queen's Bays. 1931 Times Lit. Suppl. 26 Mar. 249/2 The contrast between these two volumes makes an interesting study. Neither is ‘period-printing’; but the Chapman is properly ‘spacious’ for an Elizabethan work; and the Pope [etc.]. 1935 N. Mitchison We have been Warned ii. 154 ‘You'll be saying you like the {oqq}Idylls of the King{cqq} next.’ ‘Oh, but I do. They're so deliciously period.’ 1937 D. L. Sayers Busman's Honeymoon xviii. 346, I was going to..have the spit turned by electricity. And an electric cooker for the days when we didn't feel so period. 1940 L. MacNeice Last Ditch 18 Cranks, hacks, poverty-stricken scholars, In pince-nez, period hats or romantic beards. 1958 B. Nichols Sweet & Twenties 79 The word ‘treasure’ is charmingly period. In the upper classes it implied the perfect Jeeves or the ideal nanny. 1960 R. A. Knox Occasional Sermons xl. 331 It is all quite convincing, and beautifully period. Why is it so period? 1965 Listener 25 Nov. 869/3 A series of Edith Wharton's novels are being reprinted..; great period interest, and well worth re-examination. 1967 E. Short Embroidery & Fabric Collage iii. 74 The heavy curtains associated with the period four-poster. 1974 Listener 10 Jan. 59/3 Whose body?..one of Dorothy Sayers's Lord Peter Wimsey stories..is period stuff, thick with now discarded or at least unfashionable snobberies. 1976 Liverpool Echo 24 Nov. 5/4 The undeniable pleasure of watching sport, natural history, travel, ballet, period dramas and even the news is taken for granted. 1977 N.Y. Rev. Bks. 29 Sept. 12/4 Baum was a handsome young man with gray eyes, straight nose, dark brown hair, and a period mustache that looked to be glued on. 1977 Radio Times 12 Nov. 4/3 It was great fun but it was ‘period’ and we wanted to get back to the present. |
b. Special Combs., as period-luminosity a. Astr., relating the period of a variable star, esp. a Cepheid, to its luminosity; period-piece, a work of art, furniture, literature, etc., considered from the aspect of its associations with or evocativeness of a past period of time; contemptuously, such a work possessing interest only from such associations or evocativeness.
| 1918 H. Shapley in Contrib. Mt. Wilson Solar Observatory No. 153. 2 For parallaxes obtained with the period-luminosity curve the accuracy appears to surpass that of direct measures on any object for which the parallax is less than 0{pp}·01, and is essentially independent of distance. 1950 Sci. News XV. 46 We can..get from the [light] curve the mean apparent magnitude and the period. From the period-luminosity relation we then find the absolute magnitude, and so, knowing both m and M we can find the distance. 1964 Listener 21 May 831/2 It was by studying the short-period variables in the Small Cloud, fifty years ago, that Miss Henrietta Leavitt, at Harvard..made the discoveries that led on to the ‘period-luminosity law’ of Cepheid stars. |
| 1927 S. Ertz Now East, Now West iii. 32 She saw she would have the pleasure of buying certain things—period pieces—that she could either sell at the end of their stay or take back to America. 1931 Times Lit. Suppl. 24 Dec. 1033/2 Spenser supported the remote splendour of his mythical heroes with deliberately archaic language, turning his poem into a period piece. 1934 C. Lambert Music Ho! iii. 172 The English folk song..is nothing more than a very pretty period piece. 1943 H. Pearson Conan Doyle v. 81 Nowadays we can see that the facile saga of Sherlock Holmes is far more valuable even as a ‘period piece’ than the diligent epic of Edward the Third. 1957 Essays & Stud. X. 54 But I am here concerned with Robert Elsmere not primarily as a work of art but as a symbol or symptom of a certain phase of liberal religious thought in the later nineteenth century—as a ‘period piece’ if you will, only that I prefer not to use a phrase which might suggest (wrongly, as I think) that the book is a mere antique. 1961 L. Mumford City in Hist. xiii. 408 Washington..might have been a miracle of the solo town planner's art: a final period-piece to close the epoch. 1972 S. Hynes Edwardian Occasions xv. 188 The essays..are belles-lettres of the most inoffensive kind..period pieces even when [Maurice] Hewlett wrote them. 1975 M. Drabble Realms of Gold iv. 269 Mays Cottage was a period piece, completely unrestored, which in these days seemed to be an asset. |
▪ II. † ˈperiod, v. Obs.
[f. prec. n.]
1. trans. To bring to a termination, put a period to; to end, conclude; to dissolve.
| 1595 Polimanteia (1881) 46, I am loath to bee too long in my aduisements to you,..and therefore heere I period them. 1607 Shakes. Timon i. i. 99 Your..Letter he desires To those haue shut him vp, which failing, Periods his comfort. 1668 Howe Bless. Righteous (1825) 301 It will calmly period all thy troubles. 1678 Gale Crt. Gentiles III. 95 This ingenuous Concession..were sufficient to period our Controversie. |
2. intr. To come to a conclusion, conclude.
| 1628 Feltham Resolves i. lxi, You may period upon this; that where there is the most pitty from others, there is the greatest misery in the partie pittied. 1656 S. H. Gold. Law 88 Here then I period. 16.. Barton Holiday's Acknowl. (N.), 'Tis some poor comfort that this mortal scope Will period. |
Hence † ˈperioding vbl. n., finishing, concluding.
| 1659 Rushw. Hist. Coll. I. 39 This Parliament..to continue for the Enacting of Laws, and Perioding of things of Reformation, as long as the necessity of the State shall require the same. |