fathom
/ˈfæðəm/
Frequency: 3.25 in modern English
Meaning
noun
A man's armspan, generally reckoned to be six feet (about 1.8 metres). Later used to measure the depth of water, but now generally replaced by the metre outside American usage.
American usage
noun
A man's armspan, generally reckoned to be six feet (about 1.8 metres). Later used to measure the depth of water, but now generally replaced by the metre outside American usage.
American usage
noun
A measure of distance to shore: the nearest point to shore at which the water depth is the value quoted.
American usage
noun
An unspecified depth.
noun
The act of stretching out one's arms away from the sides of the torso so that they make a straight line perpendicular to the body.
Obsolete
Example Sentences
- "[T]he ſhipmen deemed that they drew neere to ſome countrey: And ſounded, and found it twentie fathoms: and when they had gone a little further, they ſounded againe, and found it fifteene fathoms."
- "Full fadom fiue thy Father lies, Of his bones are Corrall made: Those are pearles that were his eies, Nothing of him that doth fade, But doth suffer a Sea-change Into someting rich, & strange"
- "And then they told me that a good many years ago, when the speakers were boys, some Wokan men who were out fishing met these lost people in the sea, and spoke to them; and the chief gave the Wokan men a hundred fathoms of cloth to bring to the men of Wanumbai, to show that they were alive and would soon come back to them[.]"
- "After we'd rowed for an hour, we found ourselves stranded ten fathoms from shore."
- "At fifty fathoms, the waters of the Southern Ocean are dark blue."
- "Another of his fathome they haue not / To leade their buſineſſe, […]"
Etymology
Origin
Word Breakdown
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /ˈfæðəm/
- British English: /ˈfað(ə)m/
Usage
- American usage
- Archaic
- Obsolete
- Transitive verb
- Intransitive verb