SIZE UP • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Size up

Add this Dictionary
to your website!
See more options...

/saɪz əp/ Listen

verb

Size v. t.

To fix the standard of. "To size weights and measures." (R.)

To adjust or arrange according to size or bulk. Specifically:

(a)

(Mil.) To take the height of men, in order to place them in the ranks according to their stature.

(b)

(Mining) To sift, as pieces of ore or metal, in order to separate the finer from the coarser parts.

To swell; to increase the bulk of.

(Mech.) To bring or adjust anything exactly to a required dimension, as by cutting.

To size up, to estimate or ascertain the character and ability of. See 4th Size, 4. (Slang, U.S.) "We had to size up our fellow legislators."

See images of 'Size up'

Etymology of 'Size up'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

Share |

"Size up" Quotes from Famous Books

... not waste any time in their rooms, but entered at once upon the work of their mission. On the piazza they halted to size up the other visitors at the hotel. From this high point of view they could see the harbor, ...

— Fighting for the Right • Oliver Optic

... a fool," he said with a certain challenge in his tone, "but this yere trail don't look good to me, somehow. These yere tracks, they don't size up the same as they done all the way out here. 'N' another thing, they ain't aimed t' meet up with the bunch that Luck's trailin'. We're headed straight out away from whar Luck's headed. 'N' any way yuh look ...

— The Heritage of the Sioux • B.M. Bower

... only illustrates very forcibly that children are not merely sleeping, and eating what is given to them, like cattle and sheep. Like adults they are surrounded with human beings and are leading moral lives. At home, in school, on the street, a hundred times a day they must "size up" people and situations and decide what is best to do. If they are weak in such decisions, they are regarded as weak in general; and if very weak, other persons must assume responsibility for them and "tote" them through life. ...

— How To Study and Teaching How To Study • F. M. McMurry

... me find Room fer my things in behind— Stript my hoss's reins down, and Put his mitt' on the right hand So's to lead—"Pile in!" says he, "But you 've struck pore company!" Noticed he was pale—looked sick, Kindo-like, and had a quick Way o' flickin' them-air eyes 0' his roun' 'at didn't size Up right with his usual style— s' I, "You well?" He tried to smile, But his chin shuck and tears come.— "I've run 'Viney ...

— Green Fields and Running Brooks, and Other Poems • James Whitcomb Riley