Etimology
From Middle English flor, flore, from Old English flōr (“floor, pavement, ground, bottom”), from Proto-West Germanic *flōr, from Proto-Germanic *flōraz (“flat surface, floor, plain”), from Proto-Indo-European *pleh₂ros (“floor”), from Proto-Indo-European *pleh₂- (“flat”). Cognate with Scots flure, fluir (“floor”), Saterland Frisian Floor (“floor”), West Frisian flier (“floor”), Dutch vloer (“floor”), German Low German Floor (“entry hall”), German Flur (“field, floor, entrance hall”), Swedish flor (“floor of a cow stall”), Irish urlár (“floor”), Scottish Gaelic làr (“floor, ground, earth”), Welsh llawr (“floor, ground”), Latin plānus (“level, flat”).
noun
floor (plural floors)
The interior bottom or surface of a house or building; the supporting surface of a room.
(geology, biology, chiefly with a modifier) The bottom surface of a natural structure, entity, or space (e.g. cave, forest, ocean, desert, etc.); the ground (surface of the Earth).
(UK, dialectal, colloquial) The ground.
(construction, architecture) A structure formed of beams, girders, etc, with proper covering, which divides a building horizontally into storeys/stories.
The supporting surface or platform of a structure such as a bridge.
(architecture) A storey/story of a building.
In a parliament, the part of the house assigned to the members, as opposed to the viewing gallery.
(by extension) The right to speak at a given time during a debate or other public event.
(nautical) That part of the bottom of a vessel on each side of the keelson which is most nearly horizontal.
(mining) A horizontal, flat ore body; the rock underlying a stratified or nearly horizontal deposit.
(mining) The bottom of a pit, pothole or mine.
(mathematics) The largest integer less than or equal to a given number.
(gymnastics) An event performed on a floor-like carpeted surface; floor exercise
(gymnastics) A floor-like carpeted surface for performing gymnastic movements.
(finance) A lower limit on the interest rate payable on an otherwise variable-rate loan, used by lenders to defend against falls in interest rates. Opposite of a cap.
A dance floor.
The trading floor of a stock exchange, pit; the area in which business is conducted at a convention or exhibition.
The area of a casino where gambling occurs.
The area of an establishment where food and drink are served to customers.
Examples
The room has a wooden floor.
A great bargain also had been the excellent Axminster carpet which covered the floor; as, again, the arm-chair in which Bunting now sat forward, staring into the dull, small fire.
The leaves covering the forest floor provide many hiding-places for small animals.
Many sunken ships rest on the ocean floor.
The floor of a cave served the refugees as a home.
The pit floor showed where a ring of post holes had been.
After stepping off the bus, my wallet fell on the floor.
Wooden planks of the old bridge's floor were nearly rotten.
For years we lived on the third floor.
When Timothy and Julia hurried up the staircase to the bedroom floor, where a considerable commotion was taking place, Tim took Barry Leach with him. He had him gripped firmly by the arm, since he felt it was not safe to let him loose, and he had no immediate idea what to do with him.
Will the senator from Arizona yield the floor?
The mayor often gives a lobbyist the floor.
The floor of 4.5 is 4.
She's a maniac, maniac on the floor / And she's dancing like she never danced before
Open the door, get on the floor / Everybody walk the dinosaur
At each table stood a young, slim, poker-faced croupier serving the punters who anxiously watched the turning of the cards. The next two floors were similar though not quite as spectacular and the stakes were lower.
The conference started as an impromptu session in the coffee shop this morning when waitresses walked off the floor rather than serve four Negro men and women delegates.
Related words
synonyms
(bottom part of a room): see Thesaurus:floor
(right to speak): possession (UK)
antonyms
ceiling
related terms
flooring
mezzanine
verb
floor (third-person singular simple present floors, present participle flooring, simple past and past participle floored)
(transitive) To cover or furnish with a floor.
To strike down or lay level with the floor; to knock down.
(informal, dated) To hang (a picture on exhibition) near the base of a wall, where it cannot easily be seen.
(driving, transitive, slang) To push (a pedal) down to the floor, especially to accelerate.
(informal, transitive) To silence by a conclusive answer or retort.
(informal, transitive) To amaze or greatly surprise.
(colloquial, transitive) To finish or make an end of.
(mathematics) To set a lower bound.
Examples
floor a house with pine boards
The huge square box, parquet-floored and high-ceilinged, had been arranged to display a suite of bedroom furniture designed and made in the halcyon days of the last quarter of the nineteenth century, […].
Sam floored him perpetually, and beat his face to a jelly, without getting a scratch.
Antonym: sky
our driver floored the pedal
floor an opponent
Floored or crushed by him.
We were floored by his confession.
Some of the attendees were “absolutely floored,” said an official familiar with the proceedings. That someone in the U.S. government could “make an argument that is so nakedly against transparency, in light of the unfolding catastrophe, was…shocking and disturbing.”
floor a college examination
I've floored my little-go work
floored division