distance
See also: distancé
English
Alternative forms
- distaunce (obsolete)
Etymology
From Middle English distance, distaunce, destaunce, from Old French destance, from Latin distantia (“distance, remoteneness, difference”), from distāns, present participle of distō (“I stand apart, I am separate, distant, or different”), from di-, dis- (“apart”) + stō (“I stand”). Compare Dutch afstand (“distance”, literally “off-stand, off-stance”), German Abstand.
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /ˈdɪs.tɪns/
- (weak vowel merger) IPA(key): /ˈdɪs.təns/
Audio (US) (file)
Noun
distance (countable and uncountable, plural distances)
- (countable) The amount of space between two points, usually geographical points, usually (but not necessarily) measured along a straight line.
- The distance to Petersborough is thirty miles.
- From Moscow, the distance is relatively short to Saint Petersburg, relatively long to Novosibirsk, but even greater to Vladivostok.
- 1918, W. B. Maxwell, chapter 5, in The Mirror and the Lamp:
- Then everybody once more knelt, and soon the blessing was pronounced. The choir and the clergy trooped out slowly, […], down the nave to the western door. […] At a seemingly immense distance the surpliced group stopped to say the last prayer.
- Length or interval of time.
- (Can we date this quote?) Matthew Prior
- ten years' distance between one and the other
- (Can we date this quote?) John Playfair
- the writings of Euclid at the distance of two thousand years
- (Can we date this quote?) Matthew Prior
- (countable, informal) The difference; the subjective measure between two quantities.
- We're narrowing the distance between the two versions of the bill. The distance between the lowest and next gear on my bicycle is annoying.
- Remoteness of place; a remote place.
- (Can we date this quote?) Washington Irving
- easily managed from a distance
- (Can we date this quote?) Thomas Campbell
- 'Tis distance lends enchantment to the view.
- (Can we date this quote?) Joseph Addison
- [He] waits at distance till he hears from Cato.
- (Can we date this quote?) Washington Irving
- Remoteness in succession or relation.
- the distance between a descendant and his ancestor
- A space marked out in the last part of a racecourse.
- (Can we date this quote?) Roger L'Estrange
- the horse that ran the whole field out of distance
- (Can we date this quote?) Roger L'Estrange
- (uncountable, figuratively) The entire amount of progress to an objective.
- He had promised to perform this task, but did not go the distance.
- (uncountable, figuratively) A withholding of intimacy; alienation; variance.
- The friendship did not survive the row: they kept each other at a distance.
- (Can we date this quote?) Francis Bacon
- Setting them [factions] at distance, or at least distrust amongst themselves.
- (Can we date this quote?) John Milton
- On the part of Heaven, / Now alienated, distance and distaste.
- 1892, Walter Besant, chapter III, in The Ivory Gate: A Novel, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, […], OCLC 16832619:
- 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. […] Strangers might enter the room, but they were made to feel that they were there on sufferance: they were received with distance and suspicion.
- The remoteness or reserve which respect requires; hence, respect; ceremoniousness.
- (Can we date this quote?) John Dryden
- I hope your modesty / Will know what distance to the crown is due.
- (Can we date this quote?) Francis Atterbury
- 'Tis by respect and distance that authority is upheld.
- (Can we date this quote?) John Dryden
- The space measured back from the winning-post which a racehorse running in a heat must reach when the winner has covered the whole course, in order to run in the final heat.
Synonyms
- (remoteness): farness
Derived terms
Terms derived from distance
- aesthetic distance
- angular distance
- automatic distance control
- braking distance
- Cartesian distance
- critical distance
- distance formula
- distance learning
- distance vision
- distancer
- edit distance
- effort distance
- equidistance
- Euclidean distance
- focal distance
- go the distance
- Hamming distance
- horizon distance
- interarch distance
- interplant distance
- keep at a distance
- keep one's distance
- Levenshtein distance
- long-distance
- luminosity distance
- mean distance between failure
- middle-distance
- polar distance
- resistance distance
- self-distance
- short-distance
- skip distance
- social distance
- spitting distance
- striking distance
- string distance
- taxicab distance
- walking distance
- zenith distance
Related terms
Translations
amount of space between two points
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Verb
distance (third-person singular simple present distances, present participle distancing, simple past and past participle distanced)
- (transitive) To move away (from) someone or something.
- He distanced himself from the comments made by some of his colleagues.
- (transitive) To leave at a distance; to outpace, leave behind.
- 1891, Mary Noailles Murfree, In the "Stranger People's" Country, Nebraska 2005, p. 71:
- Then the horse, with muscles strong as steel, distanced the sound.
- 1891, Mary Noailles Murfree, In the "Stranger People's" Country, Nebraska 2005, p. 71:
Derived terms
Translations
move away
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Further reading
- distance in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
- distance in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.
- distance at OneLook Dictionary Search
Danish
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /distanɡsə/, [d̥iˈsd̥ɑŋsə]
Declension
Declension of distance
common gender |
Singular | Plural | ||
---|---|---|---|---|
indefinite | definite | indefinite | definite | |
nominative | distance | distancen | distancer | distancerne |
genitive | distances | distancens | distancers | distancernes |
French
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /dis.tɑ̃s/
- Rhymes: -ɑ̃s
audio (file)
Verb
distance
- inflection of distancer:
- first-person and third-person singular present indicative
- first-person and third-person singular present subjunctive
- second-person singular imperative
Further reading
- “distance” in le Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).
Latvian
Declension
Declension of distance (5th declension)
singular (vienskaitlis) | plural (daudzskaitlis) | |
---|---|---|
nominative (nominatīvs) | distance | distances |
accusative (akuzatīvs) | distanci | distances |
genitive (ģenitīvs) | distances | distanču |
dative (datīvs) | distancei | distancēm |
instrumental (instrumentālis) | distanci | distancēm |
locative (lokatīvs) | distancē | distancēs |
vocative (vokatīvs) | distance | distances |
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