📖 M — The English dictionary · page 27

methodist — Everyday, meaning 1: A member of the Methodist Church, a Christian group started in England.↗ Everyday, meaning 2: (adjective) To do with this church (a Methodist chapel).↗ Example: Our neighbours go to the Methodist church on the corner.↗ · The Methodist chapel in the village is very old.↗ · She is a Methodist and sings in the choir.↗ · Methodists are a kind of Christian.↗ · We visited a Methodist school on our trip.↗ · The Methodist Church runs a food bank in town.↗

methuselah — Everyday, meaning 1: (Bible) Methuselah is a man in the Book of Genesis who is said to have lived 969 years, the oldest person in the Bible.↗ Everyday, meaning 2: (informal) A methuselah is a very old person or thing.↗ Everyday, meaning 3: A methuselah is also a very large wine bottle holding six litres.↗ Example: The Bible says Methuselah lived to be 969 years old.↗ · Grandad jokes that he is as old as Methuselah.↗ · Methuselah was the grandfather of Noah.↗ · A pine tree called Methuselah is nearly 5,000 years old.↗ · That old car is a real methuselah.↗ · A methuselah holds as much as eight normal bottles.↗ · And Enoch lived sixty and five years, and begot Methuselah.↗ (Torah GEN.5.21, JPS 1917)↗ · And Methuselah lived a hundred eighty and seven years, and begot Lamech.↗ (Torah GEN.5.25, JPS 1917)↗ · And all the days of Methuselah were nine hundred sixty and nine years; and he died.↗ (Torah GEN.5.27, JPS 1917)↗

metic — In Jewish tradition, meaning 1: In ancient Greece, a foreigner who lived in a city without being a citizen.↗

metre — Everyday, meaning 1: A metre is a measure of length; a big step is about one metre.↗ Everyday, meaning 2: A meter is also a machine that measures something, like a water meter or a parking meter.↗ Everyday, meaning 3: Metre can mean the beat in a poem or a song.↗ Example: A rope is 21 metres long.↗ · Sam runs 100 metres.↗ · The garden is 8 metres long and 5 metres wide.↗ · A metre is 100 centimetres.↗ · A kilometre is 1000 metres.↗ · The door is about 2 metres high.↗ · The giraffe is over 5 metres tall.↗ · Measure the room with a metre stick.↗

metric — Everyday, meaning 1: (maths, science) Using the metric system of measurement, based on the metre, the kilogram and the litre, with units that go up in tens (10, 100, 1,000).↗ Everyday, meaning 2: (noun, formal) A measure used to judge or compare how well something is doing, such as test scores or sales.↗ Everyday, meaning 3: (poetry, rare) To do with the rhythm or metre of a poem.↗ Example: Most countries use the metric system.↗ · Centimetres and kilograms are metric units.↗ · In the UK, road signs show miles, but food is weighed in metric.↗ · A metric tonne is 1,000 kilograms.↗ · Convert 3 metres into centimetres using metric rules: 300 cm.↗ · The USA still mostly uses imperial, not metric.↗ · The company uses customer happiness as a key metric.↗

metro — Everyday, meaning 1: A metro is an underground railway system in a city, also called a subway (US) or the Underground or Tube (London).↗ Everyday, meaning 2: (US, Canada, Australia, informal) Metro means the whole city area including its suburbs, as in «the metro area».↗ Everyday, meaning 3: Metro is part of the names of some newspapers, buses and shops.↗ Example: We took the metro to the museum.↗ · The metro station was crowded at rush hour.↗ · In Paris, the Métro has stations with pretty old signs.↗ · The metro map shows lines in different colours.↗ · The storm stopped the metro trains for an hour.↗ · The Toronto metro area has millions of people.↗

metronome — Everyday, meaning 1: A metronome is a device that ticks or clicks at a steady speed to help musicians keep time.↗ Example: My piano teacher sets the metronome to 80 beats a minute.↗ · The metronome clicked steadily.↗ · Practise with a metronome to keep a steady beat.↗ · The old metronome has a swinging arm.↗ · There is a metronome app on my phone.↗ · His running steps were as regular as a metronome.↗

metropolis — Everyday, meaning 1: A very large, important city, often the main city of a country.↗ Example: He had never been to the metropolis before.↗ · The boy travelled to the metropolis to find work.↗ · London is a busy metropolis.↗

metropolitan — Everyday, meaning 1: Metropolitan means belonging to a very big city, called a metropolis, and the towns around it.↗ Everyday, meaning 2: (church) A metropolitan is a senior bishop in charge of an area, especially in the Orthodox churches.↗ Everyday, meaning 3: Metropolitan France means the main part of France in Europe, not its overseas lands.↗ Example: More than five million people live in the Melbourne metropolitan area.↗ · The Metropolitan Police look after London.↗ · We visited the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.↗ · Metropolitan areas often have busy trains and buses.↗ · The metropolitan led the Easter service in the cathedral.↗ · Transport for London runs the Metropolitan line on the Underground.↗ · Rural areas are quieter than metropolitan ones.↗

mettle — Everyday, meaning 1: Courage and strength of character, shown when a person faces a hard test.↗ Example: The knight showed his mettle in the battle.↗ · The hard race will test your mettle.↗ · Bold and proud, he was eager to prove his mettle.↗

mew — Everyday, meaning 1: The soft, high crying sound a cat or kitten makes; to make this sound.↗ Everyday, meaning 2: The cry of a gull or other bird, especially the mew gull (a kind of seagull).↗ Everyday, meaning 3: (mews, UK) A row of old stables in a city, now turned into houses, or a small street with such houses.↗ Early Modern English, meaning 1: In the Torah, a mew is a sea-gull, a seabird; in the fairy tales it is a cat's soft high cry.↗ Example: The kitten mewed for its mother.↗ · We heard a tiny mew from under the shed.↗ · Gulls mewed over the harbour.↗ · My aunt lives in a mews in London.↗ · The cat gave a sad little mew at the door.↗ · A mew gull is smaller than a herring gull.↗ · And then it mewed more than ever.↗ · and the ostrich, and the night-hawk, and the sea-mew, and the hawk after its kinds; (Torah LEV.11.16, JPS 1917)↗ · and the ostrich, and the night-hawk, and the sea-mew, and the hawk after its kinds;↗ (Torah LEV.11.16, JPS 1917) · And then it mewed more than ever.↗ (The Book of Dragons) · "Well, I should have mewed," said the kitchen-cat.↗ (Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen)

mews — Everyday, meaning 1: (UK) A row of old stables in a small street or yard, often now turned into houses or flats; also the name of the little street: «a mews house».↗ Everyday, meaning 2: (verb form) Third person of «mew»: the cat mews, meaning it makes a soft crying sound.↗ Everyday, meaning 3: (old) A building where hunting hawks were kept, especially while they moulted.↗ Everyday, meaning 4: In old books, mews can mean a seagull, a bird that cries over the sea.↗ Example: They live in a pretty mews house in London.↗ · The mews used to be stables for horses.↗ · The cobbled mews is closed to cars.↗ · The tiny kitten mews for its mother.↗ · Our address is 4 Stable Mews.↗ · A mews was once where hawks were kept.↗ · The kitten mewed and mewed until we fed it.↗ · Many mews houses still have big old stable doors.↗ · The great white sea-mews flew over her head, and screamed as the crows and daws screamed at home in the garden of the manor house.↗

mexican — Everyday, meaning 1: (adjective) From or to do with Mexico, its people, language or culture.↗ Everyday, meaning 2: (noun) A person from Mexico.↗ Everyday, meaning 3: (adjective) Food in the style of Mexico, such as tacos and burritos.↗ Example: We had Mexican food for dinner: tacos and beans.↗ · My friend's mum is Mexican.↗ · The crowd did a Mexican wave around the stadium.↗ · Mexican flags are green, white and red.↗ · Many Mexicans speak Spanish.↗ · The Mexican desert is home to many cacti.↗ · We learned a Mexican song in music.↗ · They opened a Mexican restaurant on our street.↗ · Then one day a favorite rabbit of the Princess's, called Frederick, mysteriously disappeared, and then came a terrible morning when the Mexican lapdog was missing.↗

mg — Everyday, meaning 1: mg is short for milligram, a very small unit of mass: there are 1,000 mg in 1 gram.↗ Everyday, meaning 2: MG (capitals) is also a British car brand.↗ Example: This vitamin tablet has 200 mg of vitamin C.↗ · 1 gram is the same as 1,000 mg.↗ · Convert 3 g into milligrams: 3,000 mg.↗ · The label says 5 mg of salt per biscuit.↗ · A grain of rice weighs about 20 mg.↗ · The doctor said to take one 250 mg tablet twice a day.↗

mi — Everyday, meaning 1: Mi is the short way to write mile, a long unit of length for roads and trips.↗ A mile is about 1.6 kilometers.↗ Everyday, meaning 2: In singing (do, re, mi), mi is the third note of the scale.↗ Example: The town is 12 mi away.↗ · She drives 30 mi each day.↗ · The trail is 4 mi long.↗ · A car goes 60 mi in one hour.↗ · The sign said: Beach 3 mi.↗ · The speed limit is 25 mph near the school.↗ · Do, re, mi, fa, so, la, ti, do.↗ · We hiked 2 mi before lunch.↗

miami — Everyday, meaning 1: A large city in the state of Florida, in the south-east of the USA, famous for its beaches, warm weather and Latin American culture.↗ Example: Miami is a city in Florida.↗ · We flew to Miami for a beach holiday.↗ · It is warm in Miami even in winter.↗ · Many people in Miami speak Spanish and English.↗ · Hurricanes sometimes hit Miami.↗ · Cruise ships leave from the port of Miami.↗ · Miami has a famous art deco district.↗

miaou — Everyday, meaning 1: The sound a cat makes.↗ Everyday, meaning 2: (verb) To make this sound: «The cat miaoued at the door».↗ Example: «Miaou!» said the little cat.↗ · The cat miaoued at the back door to be let in.↗ · Our kitten gives a tiny miaou when she is hungry.↗ · In French books cats say «miaou».↗ · «Miaou» is a word that sounds like the noise it names.↗ · The cat's miaous woke me up at five o'clock.↗ · I heard a sad miaou from the shed.↗ · Dogs say «woof», cats say «miaou».↗ · "Miaou!" said Old Tom in answer.↗

miaow — Everyday, meaning 1: A miaow is the sound a cat makes.↗ Everyday, meaning 2: To miaow is to make that sound.↗ Example: The kitten gave a little miaow.↗ · «Miaow!» said the cat at the door.↗ · Our cat miaows when she is hungry.↗ · The cat miaowed all night.↗ · «Miaow» is an onomatopoeia.↗ · I heard a sad miaow from the tree.↗

miasma — Everyday, meaning 1: A cloud of bad-smelling, unhealthy air, such as the smell from rotting things or a swamp.↗ Everyday, meaning 2: (figurative) A heavy, unpleasant feeling that hangs over a place: «a miasma of gloom».↗ Everyday, meaning 3: (history of science) The old wrong idea that diseases like cholera were caused by «bad air» (miasma), before germs were discovered.↗ Example: A miasma rose from the rotting swamp.↗ · People once blamed cholera on miasma, or bad air.↗ · John Snow showed that dirty water, not miasma, spread cholera.↗ · A miasma of cigarette smoke filled the old pub.↗ · A miasma of sadness hung over the empty house.↗ · Miasma theory was replaced by germ theory.↗ · The dragon's cave was full of a foul miasma.↗ · Florence Nightingale also believed in miasma, but her cleaning still saved lives.↗

mic — Everyday, meaning 1: (informal) Short for microphone: a device that picks up sound so it can be made louder or recorded.↗ Everyday, meaning 2: (verb, informal) To put a microphone on someone: they mic'd up the speaker.↗ Example: Can you hear me?↗ Is my mic working?↗ · The head teacher tapped the mic before speaking.↗ · Please mute your mic during the video lesson.↗ · We sang at the open mic night.↗ · «Mic check, one, two!»↗ · The singer dropped the mic at the end.↗ · They mic'd up the footballer for the interview.↗ · My gaming headset has a mic.↗

mica — Everyday, meaning 1: A mineral found in rocks that splits into very thin, shiny, see-through sheets.↗ Everyday, meaning 2: The glittery flakes of this mineral seen in rocks such as granite.↗ Example: The granite sparkled with flakes of mica.↗ · Mica splits into thin, see-through layers.↗ · We found mica in the rock sample.↗ · Some glittery make-up contains mica.↗ · Mica does not melt easily, so it is used in heaters.↗ · The teacher peeled a thin sheet of mica with a knife.↗ · Mica makes some sand glitter in the sun.↗ · Now Mephibosheth had a young son, whose name was Mica.↗ (Prophets 2SA.9.12, JPS 1917)↗ · and Bakbakkar, Heresh, and Galal, and Mattaniah the son of Mica, the son of Zichri, the son of Asaph; (Writings 1CH.9.15, JPS 1917)↗

michael — Everyday, meaning 1: Michael is a common boy's and man's name in English-speaking countries (a name); short forms are Mike, Mick, Mikey and Mickey.↗ Everyday, meaning 2: (Bible, church) Michael is an archangel in the Bible, who Christians believe leads God's angels against evil; Saint Michael is shown with a sword, defeating a dragon.↗ Example: Michael sits next to me in maths.↗ · My uncle Michael is called Mike for short.↗ · Saint Michael is shown defeating a dragon.↗ · In the Bible, Michael is an archangel.↗ · Michael scored the winning goal.↗ · The church is named after Saint Michael.↗ · Of the tribe of Asher, Sethur the son of Michael.↗ (Torah NUM.13.13, JPS 1917)↗ · and Michael, and Ishpah, and Joha, were the sons of Beriah.↗ (Writings 1CH.8.16, JPS 1917)↗ · the son of Michael, the son of Baaseiah, the son of Malchijah; (Writings 1CH.6.25, JPS 1917)↗ · of Judah, Elihu, one of the brethren of David; of Issachar, Omri the son of Michael; (Writings 1CH.27.18, JPS 1917)↗