Nines


[nahyn] /naɪn/

noun
1.
a cardinal number, eight plus one.
2.
a symbol for this number, as 9 or IX.
3.
a set of this many persons or things.
4.
a baseball team.
5.
a playing card with nine pips.
6.
the Nine, the Muses.
adjective
7.
amounting to nine in number.
Idioms
8.
dressed to the nines, looking one’s best; dressed smartly, splendidly, etc.:
All the girls were dressed to the nines for the party.
/naɪn/
noun
1.
the cardinal number that is the sum of one and eight See also number (sense 1)
2.
a numeral, 9, IX, etc, representing this number
3.
something representing, represented by, or consisting of nine units, such as a playing card with nine symbols on it
4.
Also nine o’clock. nine hours after noon or midnight: the play starts at nine
5.
(informal) dressed to the nines, dressed up to the nines, elaborately dressed
6.
999, (in Britain) the telephone number of the emergency services
7.
nine to five, normal office hours: he works nine to five, a nine-to-five job
determiner
8.

n.

in phrase to the nines “to perfection” (1787) first attested in Burns, apparently preserves the ancient notion of the perfection of the number as three times three (e.g. the nine Muses, etc.

[T]he Book of St. Albans, in the sections on blasonry, lays great stress on the nines in which all perfect things (orders of angels, virtues, articles of chivalry, differences of coat armour, etc.) occur. [Weekley]

No one seems to consider that it might be a corruption and misdivision of to then anes, literally “for the one (purpose or occasion),” a similar construction to the one that yielded nonce (q.v.).

n.

Old English nigen, from Proto-Germanic *niwun (cf. Old Saxon nigun, Old Frisian niugun, Old Norse niu, Swedish nio, Middle Dutch neghen, Dutch negen, Old High German niun, German neun, Gothic niun “nine”), from PIE newn “nine” (cf. Sanskrit nava, Avestan nava, Greek ennea, Albanian nende, Latin novem (with change of -n- to -m- by analogy of septem, decem), Lithuanian devnyi, Old Church Slavonic deveti (the Balto-Slavic forms by dissimilation of -n- to -d-), Old Irish noin, Welsh naw).

Nine to five “the average workday” is attested from 1935. Nine days has been proverbial since 14c. for the time which a wonder or novelty holds attention.

noun

A nine-millimeter semiautomatic pistol: There was a fight. I saw a man running with a nine/ People seeking guns for personal combat want reliable stopping power, revolvers or semiautomatic pistols known as ”nines” (1990s+)

verb

: Motherfucker tried to stiff me on a buy and I nined him right there
National Institute of Nutritional Education
see:

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