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Webster 1913 Edition


Somewhat

Some′whatˊ

,
Noun.
1.
More or less; a certain quantity or degree; a part, more or less; something.
These salts have
somewhat
of a nitrous taste.
Grew.
Somewhat
of his good sense will suffer, in this transfusion, and much of the beauty of his thoughts will be lost.
Dryden.
2.
A person or thing of importance; a somebody.
Here come those that worship me.
They think that I am
somewhat
.
Tennyson.

Some′whatˊ

,
adv.
In some degree or measure; a little.
His giantship is gone,
somewhat
crestfallen.
Milton.
Somewhat
back from the village street.
Longfellow.

Webster 1828 Edition


Somewhat

SOMEWHAT

,
Noun.
[some and what.]
1.
Something, though uncertain what.
2.
More or less; a certain quantity or degree, indeterminate. These salts have somewhat of a nitrous taste.
3.
A part, greater or less. Somewhat of his good sense will suffer in this transfusion, and much of the beauty of his thoughts will be lost.

SOMEWHAT

,
adv.
In some degree or quantity. This is somewhat more or less than was expected; he is somewhat aged; he is somewhat disappointed; somewhat disturbed.

Definition 2024


somewhat

somewhat

English

Alternative forms

  • (British, dialectal) summat (and variants listed there)

Adverb

somewhat (not comparable)

  1. (degree) To a limited extent or degree.
    The crowd was somewhat larger than expected, perhaps due to the good weather.
    The decision to shave or not is a somewhat personal one.
    • 1898, Winston Churchill, chapter 2, in The Celebrity:
      I had occasion […] to make a somewhat long business trip to Chicago, and on my return […] I found Farrar awaiting me in the railway station. He smiled his wonted fraction by way of greeting, […], and finally leading me to his buggy, turned and drove out of town. I was completely mystified at such an unusual proceeding.

Translations

See also

Pronoun

somewhat

  1. (archaic) Something.
    • 1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, III.12:
      Proceeding to the midst he stil did stand, / As if in minde he somewhat had to say […].
    • Robert Trail
      But this text and theme I am upon, relates to somewhat far higher and greater, than all the beholdings of his glory that ever any saint on earth received.
    • 1749, Henry Fielding, The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling
      Mr Jones had somewhat about him, which, though I think writers are not thoroughly agreed in its name, doth certainly inhabit some human breasts []
    • 1851, Herman Melville, Moby-Dick
      Not seldom in this life, when, on the right side, fortune's favourites sail close by us, we, though all adroop before, catch somewhat of the rushing breeze, and joyfully feel our bagging sails fill out.

Translations

Noun

somewhat (plural somewhats)

  1. More or less; a certain quantity or degree; a part, more or less; something.
    • Grew
      These salts have somewhat of a nitrous taste.
    • Dryden
      Somewhat of his good sense will suffer, in this transfusion, and much of the beauty of his thoughts will be lost.
  2. A person or thing of importance; a somebody.
    • Tennyson
      Here come those that worship me. / They think that I am somewhat.
    • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
      Pity that the researchful notary has not either told us in what century, and of what history, he was a writer, or been simply content to depose, that Lollius, if a writer of that name existed at all, was a somewhat somewhere.

Statistics

Most common English words before 1923: remain · covered · born · #718: somewhat · figure · goes · youth