Free translatorFree translator
Synonyms, antonyms, pronunciation

  Home
English Dictionary      examples: 'day', 'get rid of', 'New York Bay'




In the main   /ɪn ðə meɪn/   Listen
noun
Main  n.  
1.
Strength; force; might; violent effort. (Obs., except in certain phrases.) "There were in this battle of most might and main." "He 'gan advance, With huge force, and with importable main."
2.
The chief or principal part; the main or most important thing. (Obs., except in special uses.) "Resolved to rest upon the title of Lancaster as the main, and to use the other two... but as supporters."
3.
Specifically:
(a)
The great sea, as distinguished from an arm, bay, etc.; the high sea; the ocean. "Struggling in the main."
(b)
The continent, as distinguished from an island; the mainland. "Invaded the main of Spain."
(c)
Principal duct or pipe, as distinguished from lesser ones; esp. (Engin.), a principal pipe leading to or from a reservoir; as, a fire main.
Forcing main, the delivery pipe of a pump.
For the main, or In the main, for the most part; in the greatest part.
With might and main, or With all one's might and main, with all one's strength; with violent effort. "With might and main they chased the murderous fox."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








Advanced search
     Find words:
Starting with
Ending with
Containing
Matching a pattern  

Synonyms
Antonyms
Quotes
Words linked to  

only single words



Share |





"In the main" Quotes from Famous Books



... the day of the banquet to the butchers, about which we have already heard. The banquet hall, you must know, was not in the main house, but connected with it by a corridor. All the servants were bustling about making preparations for the feast, save only Little John, who must needs lie abed the greater part of the day. But he presented himself at last, when the dinner was half ...
— Robin Hood • J. Walker McSpadden

... so easy as to assert. But we will leave this to another time. I dare say that in the main there is no great difference between us. You wish for all the good things you can get; and so do I. One of us may take a more round about way to obtain them than the other: but we both intend to travel to the same goal. I own, when I heard of your brouillerie ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft

... in the relation of the Old Man of the Sea to Sinbad), as an independent entity, I desire to say that the evidence before me, whether hostile or friendly to the General and his schemes, is distinctly favourable to them. It exhibits them as, in the main, poor, uninstructed, not unfrequently fanatical, enthusiasts, the purity of whose lives, the sincerity of whose belief, and the cheerfulness of whose endurance of privation and rough usage, in what they consider a just cause, ...
— Evolution and Ethics and Other Essays • Thomas H. Huxley

... plaster and marble out of countenance with an insensible audacity, which we drive out of such refined company, as we would a clown from a drawing-room, but which we nevertheless seek in its own place, as we would seek the conversation of the clown in his own turnip-field, if he were sensible in the main. ...
— The Poetry of Architecture • John Ruskin

... says, may best be studied "among the statues of the Egyptian rooms of the British Museum; the larger gentle eye, the full but not over-protruding lips, the rounded contour, and the good-natured, easy, sensuous expression. This is the genuine African model." To this race Africa in the main and parts of Asia have belonged since ...
— The Negro • W.E.B. Du Bois


More quotes...



Copyright © 2024 Free Translator.org