Etimology
From Middle English glas, from Old English glæs, from Proto-West Germanic *glas, from Proto-Germanic *glasą, possibly related to Proto-Germanic *glōaną (“to shine”) (compare glow), and ultimately from the Proto-Indo-European root *ǵʰel- (“to shine, shimmer, glow”). Cognate with West Frisian glês, Dutch glas, Low German Glas, German Glas, Swedish glas, Icelandic gler.
noun
glass (countable and uncountable, plural glasses)
(usually uncountable) An amorphous solid, often transparent substance, usually made by melting silica sand with various additives (for most purposes, a mixture of soda, potash and lime is added).
(countable, uncountable, by extension) Any amorphous solid (one without a regular crystal lattice).
(countable) A vessel from which one drinks, especially one made of glass, plastic, or similar translucent or semi-translucent material.
(metonymically) The quantity of liquid contained in such a vessel.
(uncountable) Glassware.
A mirror.
A magnifying glass or telescope.
(sports) A barrier made of solid, transparent material.
A barometer.
(attributive, in names of species) Transparent or translucent.
(obsolete) An hourglass.
(uncountable, photography, informal) Lenses, considered collectively.
(now rare) A pane of glass; a window (especially of a coach or similar vehicle).
Examples
The tabletop is made of glass.
A popular myth is that window glass is actually an extremely viscous liquid.
The ability of a segment of a glass sphere to magnify whatever is placed before it was known around the year 1000, when the spherical segment was called a reading stone, essentially what today we might term a frameless magnifying glass or plain glass paperweight.
Metal glasses, unlike those based on silica, are electrically conductive, which can be either an advantage or a disadvantage, depending on the application.
Fill my glass with milk, please.
There is half a glass of milk in each pound of chocolate we produce.
Here was my chance. I took the old man aside, and two or three glasses of Old Crow launched him into reminiscence.
At half-past nine on this Saturday evening, the parlour of the Salutation Inn, High Holborn, contained most of its customary visitors. […] 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.
We collected art glass.
[…] for what lady can abide to love a spruce silken-face courtier, that stands every morning two or three hours learning how to look by his glass, how to speak by his glass, how to sigh by his glass, how to court his mistress by his glass? I would wish him no other plague, but to have a mistress as brittle as glass.
As of old, he took down his portable glass hanging on a nail, and carefully wiping it, replaced it in its case.
She adjusted her lipstick in the glass.
Haviers, or stags which have been gelded when young, have no horns, as is well known, and in the early part of the stalking season, when seen through a glass, might be mistaken for hummels […]
He got a good glass for six hundred dollars.His new job gave him leisure for star-gazing.Often he bid me come and have a lookUp the brass barrel, velvet black inside,At a star quaking in the other end.
He caught the rebound off the glass.
He fired the outlet pass off the glass.
The glass is falling hour by hour, the glass will fall for ever / But if you break the bloody glass you won’t hold up the weather.
glass frog; glass shrimp; glass worm
Were my Wiues Liuer / Infected ſhe would not liue / The running of one Glaſſe.
Her new camera was incompatible with her old one, so she needed to buy new glass.
[N]o sooner had we entered Holbourn than letting down one of the Front Glasses I enquired of every decent-looking Person that we passed ‘If they had seen my Edward?’
Related words
hyponyms
(vessel): See Category:en:Vessels
(material): lechatelierite, pyrex, Pyrex
related terms
glaze
glazier
glazing
verb
glass (third-person singular simple present glasses, present participle glassing, simple past and past participle glassed)
(transitive) To fit with glass; to glaze.
(transitive) To enclose in glass.
(transitive) Clipping of fibreglass. To fit, cover, fill, or build, with fibreglass-reinforced resin composite (fiberglass).
(transitive, UK, colloquial) To strike (someone), particularly in the face, with a drinking glass with the intent of causing injury.
(transitive, science fiction) To bombard an area with such intensity (by means of a nuclear bomb, fusion bomb, etc) as to melt the landscape into glass.
(transitive) To view through an optical instrument such as binoculars.
(transitive) To smooth or polish (leather, etc.), by rubbing it with a glass burnisher.
(archaic, reflexive) To reflect; to mirror.
(transitive) To make glassy.
(intransitive) To become glassy.
Examples
As Iewels in Christall for some Prince to buy. / Who tendring their own worth from whence they were glast,
And to ſatisfie my ſelf, that the diverſity came not from the Paper, vvhich one might ſuſpect capable of imbibing the Liquor, and altering the Colour, I made the Tryal upon a flat piece of purely VVhite Glaſs'd Earth, […]
JUDD. Any trouble last night?
LES. Usual. Couple of punks got glassed.
I often mused on what the politicians or authorities would say if they could see for themselves the horrendous consequences of someone who’d been glassed, or viciously assaulted.
One night he was in this nightclub in Sheffield and he got glassed by this bloke who’d been just let out of prison that day.
“The Covenant don’t ‘miss’ anything when they glass a planet,” the Master Chief replied.
Andy took his binoculars and glassed the area below.
One of the keys to glassing effectively is supporting your binoculars. Advanced glassers who scan lots of country for long periods of time, or who use binoculars of 10X power or more, often use a lightweight camera tripod […]
Happy to glass themselves in so brilliant a mirror.
Where the Almighty's form glasses itself in tempests.
Not only were his eyes averted from mine, but they were glassed to an uncanny degree.
Bourez had timed it perfectly: a wind that was forecast for the morning began to stir just after his arrival and the sea glassed off for a brief period before the waves grew bigger and bigger.