different between amount vs length

English

Etymology

From Middle English amounten (“to mount up to, come up to, signify”), from Old French amonter (“to amount to”), from amont, amunt (“uphill, upward”), from the prepositional phrase a mont (“toward or to a mountain or heap”), from Latin ad montem, from ad (“to”) + montem, accusative of mons (“mountain”).

Pronunciation

• enPR: ?.mount', IPA^(key): /??ma?nt/
• Rhymes: -a?nt

Noun

amount (plural amounts)

1. The total, aggregate or sum of material (not applicable to discrete numbers or units or items in standard English).

2. A quantity or volume.
3. (nonstandard, sometimes proscribed) The number (the sum) of elements in a set.

Hyponyms

• notional amount
• principal amount

Derived terms

• paramount

Translations

Verb

amount (third-person singular simple present amounts, present participle amounting, simple past and past participle amounted)

1. (intransitive, followed by to) To total or evaluate.

   It amounts to three dollars and change.

2. (intransitive, followed by to) To be the same as or equivalent to.

   He was a pretty good student, but never amounted to much professionally.

   His response amounted to gross insubordination

3. (obsolete, intransitive) To go up; to ascend.

Translations

See also

• extent
• magnitude
• measurement
• number
• quantity
• size

Further reading

• amount in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• amount in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.
• amount at OneLook Dictionary Search

Anagrams

• mantou, moutan, outman, tomaun

English

Etymology

From Middle English lengthe, from Old English lengþu (“longness; length”), from Proto-West Germanic *langiþu, from Proto-Germanic *langiþ?, equivalent to long +? -th. Cognate with Scots lenth, lainth (“length”), Saterland Frisian Loangte (“length”), West Frisian lingte, langte (“length”), Dutch lengte (“length”), German Low German Längde, Längd, Längte, Längt (“length”), Danish længde (“length”), Swedish längd (“length”), Icelandic lengd (“length”).

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation, General American) enPR: l?ng(k)th, l?n(t)th, IPA^(key): /l??(k)?/, /l?n(t)?/
• Rhymes: -??k?, -???, -?nt?, -?n?

Noun

length (countable and uncountable, plural lengths)

1. The distance measured along the longest dimension of an object.
2. Duration.
   • 1941, Robert Frost, The Gift Outright

     Happiness makes up in height for what it lacks in length.

3. (horse racing) The length of a horse, used to indicate the distance between horses at the end of a race.
4. (mathematics) Distance between the two ends of a line segment.
5. (cricket) The distance down the pitch that the ball bounces on its way to the batsman.
6. (figuratively) Total extent.

7. Part of something that is long; a physical piece of something.

8. (theater) A unit of script length, comprising 42 lines.
   • 1890, Henry Austin, Address of Henry Austin Before the Second Nationalist Club (page 38)

     […] open your book of the play, which you have previously carefully perused, and at the same time marked with the proper calls, as thus: a length (or 42 lines) before an entrance, with a pen make a figure on the margin, […]

   • 1960, J. L. Hodgkinson, ?Rex Pogson, The Early Manchester Theatre (page 45)

     The boy was engaged to write out parts at a penny a length (42 lines) for Chetwood, who then charged the manager, […]

Derived terms

Translations

Verb

length (third-person singular simple present lengths, present participle lengthing, simple past and past participle lengthed)

1. (obsolete) To lengthen.
   • 1599, William Shakespeare, The Passionate Pilgrim, XIV. 30:

     Pack night, peep day; good day, of night now borrow: / Short night, to-night, and length thyself to-morrow.

   • 1552, Richard Huloet, "Ladies of Destinie" in Abecedarium Anglico-Latinum

     Was never man such favour could off atall ladies fynde, To cause them lengthe or shorte the day which they to hym assynde.

   • a. 1608, Thomas Sackville, Allegorical Personages described in Hell

     [He] knows full well life doth but length his pain.