different between gross vs engross

English

Etymology

From Middle English gross (“whole, entire; flagrant, monstrous”), from Old French gros (“big, thick, large, stout”), from Late Latin grossus (“thick in diameter, coarse”), and Medieval Latin grossus (“great, big”), influenced by Old High German gr?z (“big, thick, coarse”), from Proto-Germanic *grautaz (“large, great, thick, coarse grained, unrefined”), from Proto-Indo-European *g?er- (“to rub, to stroke, to grind”). Cognate with French grossier (“gross”). See also French dialectal grôt, groût (“large”) (Berry) and grô (“large”) (Burgundy), Catalan gros (“big”), Dutch groot (“big, large”), German groß (“large”), English great. More at great.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /????s/
• (US) IPA^(key): /??o?s/
• Homophone: Gross
• Rhymes: -??s

Adjective

gross (comparative grosser or more gross, superlative grossest or most gross)

1. (of behaviour considered to be wrong) Highly or conspicuously offensive.

   Synonyms: serious, flagrant, shameful, appalling, egregious.

   • c. 1595, William Shakespeare, Richard II, Act II, Scene 3,^[1]

     Henry IV. My gracious uncle, let me know my fault:

     On what condition stands it and wherein?

     Edmund of Langley. Even in condition of the worst degree,

     In gross rebellion and detested treason:

   • 1682, Aphra Behn, The City-Heiress, London: D. Brown et al., Act IV, Scene 1, p. 40,^[2]

     Your very faults, how gross soere, to me

     Have something pleasing in ’em.

   • 1749, Henry Fielding, The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling, Dublin: John Smith, Volume 3, Book 18, Chapter 10, p. 336,^[3]

     […] I thank Heaven I have had Time to reflect on my past Life, where though I cannot charge myself with any gross Villainy, yet I can discern Follies and Vices too sufficient to repent and to be ashamed of;

   • 1813, Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice, Chapter 13,^[4]

     […] had his actions been what Wickham represented them, so gross a violation of every thing right could hardly have been concealed from the world;

   • 1908, Kenneth Grahame, The Wind in the Willows, Chapter 6,^[5]

     […] he has been found guilty, on the clearest evidence, first, of stealing a valuable motor-car; secondly, of driving to the public danger; and, thirdly, of gross impertinence to the rural police.

2. (of an amount) Excluding any deductions; including all associated amounts.

   Synonyms: whole, entire, overall, total, aggregate

   Antonym: net

   • c. 1597, William Shakespeare, Henry IV, Part 2, Act II, Scene 1,^[6]

     What is the gross sum that I owe thee?

   • 1878, Thomas Hardy, The Return of the Native, Book 6, Chapter 1,^[7]

     For a man of his habits the house and the hundred and twenty pounds a year which he had inherited from his mother were enough to supply all worldly needs. Resources do not depend upon gross amounts, but upon the proportion of spendings to takings.

   • 1937, George Orwell, The Road to Wigan Pier, Penguin, 1962, Part 1, Chapter 3, p. 37,^[8]

     […] please notice that even these wretched earnings are gross earnings. On top of this there are all kinds of stoppages which are deducted from the miner’s wages every week.

3. (sciences, pathology) Seen without a microscope (usually for a tissue or an organ); at a large scale; not detailed.

   Synonym: macroscopic

   Antonym: microscopic

   • 1962, Rachel Carson, Silent Spring, Boston: Houghton Mifflin, Chapter 12, p. 190,^[9]

     We are accustomed to look for the gross and immediate effect and to ignore all else. Unless this appears promptly and in such obvious form that it cannot be ignored, we deny the existence of hazard.

4. (slang, Canada, US) Causing disgust.

   Synonyms: gro, grody, grotty, disgusting, nasty, revolting, yucky

   • 1978, Armistead Maupin, Tales of the City, New York: Harper & Row, 1989, “Ties That Bind,” p. 293,^[10]

     Mary Ann spent her lunch hour at Hastings, picking out just the right tie for Norman. The hint might not be terribly subtle, she decided, but somebody had to do something about that gross, gravy-stained clip-on number.

   • 2002, Jeffrey Eugenides, Middlesex, New York: Picador, Book 3, p. 306,^[11]

     The next-door neighbor’s cat coughed up a hairball one day and the hair was not the cat’s. “That’s so gross!”

5. Lacking refinement in behaviour or manner; offending a standard of morality.

   Synonyms: coarse, rude, vulgar, obscene, impure

   • 1777, Richard Brinsley Sheridan, The School for Scandal, Act I, Scene 1, ^[12]

     Verjuice. She certainly has Talents.

     Lady Sneerwell. But her manner is gross.

   • 1874: Dodsley et al., A Select Collection of Old English Plays

     But man to know God is a difficulty, except by a mean he himself inure, which is to know God’s creatures that be: at first them that be of the grossest nature, and then [...] them that be more pure.
6. (of a product) Lacking refinement; not of high quality.

   Synonyms: coarse, rough, unrefined

   Antonym: fine

   • 1860, John Ruskin, Modern Painters, Volume 5, Part 6, Chapter 10, § 5,^[13]

     The flowers of Rubens are gross and rude […]

   • 1944, Emily Carr, The House of All Sorts, “Lorenzo Was Registered,” ^[14]

     He scorned my wholesome kennel fare, toothing out dainties and leaving the grosser portions to be finished by the other dogs.

7. (of a person) Heavy in proportion to one's height; having a lot of excess flesh.

   Synonyms: great, large, bulky, fat, obese

   • 1925, W. Somerset Maugham, The Painted Veil, London: Heinemann, 1934, Chapter 79,^[15]

     Kitty noticed that her sister’s pregnancy had blunted her features and in her black dress she looked gross and blousy.

   • 2013, Hilary Mantel, ‘Royal Bodies’, London Review of Books, 35.IV:

     He collected a number of injuries that stopped him jousting, and then in middle age became stout, eventually gross.

8. (archaic) Not sensitive in perception or feeling.

   Synonyms: dull, witless

   • 1611, King James Version of the Bible, Matthew 13.15,^[16]

     For this people’s heart is waxed gross, and their ears are dull of hearing, and their eyes they have closed; lest at any time they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears, and should understand with their heart, and should be converted, and I should heal them.

   • 1634, John Milton, Comus, in Poems of Mr. John Milton, London: Humphrey Moseley, 1645, p. ,^[17]

     A thousand liveried Angels lacky her [the chaste soul],

     Driving far off each thing of sin and guilt,

     And in cleer dream, and solemn vision

     Tell her of things that no gross ear can hear.

9. (now chiefly poetic) Difficult or impossible to see through.

   Synonyms: thick, heavy

   • 1594, Christopher Marlowe, Edward II, London: William Jones,^[18]

     Couragious Lancaster, imbrace thy king,

     And as grosse vapours perish by the sunne,

     Euen so let hatred with thy soueraigne smile,

   • 1611, King James Version of the Bible, Isaiah 60.2,^[19]

     For, behold, the darkness shall cover the earth, and gross darkness the people: but the Lord shall arise upon thee, and his glory shall be seen upon thee.

   • 1785, William Cowper, The Task, London: J. Johnson, Book 3, p. 116,^[20]

     A pestilent and most corrosive steam,

     Like a gross fog Boeotian, rising fast,

     And fast condensed upon the dewy sash,

     Asks egress;

   • 1870, James Russell Lowell, The Cathedral, Boston: Fields, Osgood, p. 34,^[21]

     […] a larger life

     Upon his own impinging, with swift glimpse

     Of spacious circles luminous with mind,

     To which the ethereal substance of his own

     Seems but gross cloud to make that visible,

     Touched to a sudden glory round the edge.

10. (obsolete) Easy to perceive.

    Synonyms: obvious, clear

    • c. 1598, William Shakespeare, Henry V, Act II, Scene 2,^[22]

      […] though the truth of it stands off as gross

      As black and white, my eye will scarcely see it.

Synonyms

• (heavy in proportion to one's height): See also Thesaurus:obese

Derived terms

• grossen
• grossish
• grossly

Translations

Noun

gross (countable and uncountable, plural gross or grosses)

1. Twelve dozen = 144.
2. The total nominal earnings or amount, before taxes, expenses, exceptions or similar are deducted. That which remains after all deductions is called net.
3. The bulk, the mass, the masses.

Translations

Verb

gross (third-person singular simple present grosses, present participle grossing, simple past and past participle grossed)

1. (transitive) To earn money, not including expenses.

   The movie grossed three million on the first weekend.

Derived terms

Related terms

• engross
• grocer, grocery, groceries

Anagrams

• Sgros, Sorgs

German

Adjective

gross (comparative grösser, superlative am grössten)

1. Switzerland and Liechtenstein standard spelling of groß

Declension

Pennsylvania German

Etymology

From Old High German gr?z, from Proto-Germanic *grautaz. Compare German groß, Dutch groot, English great.

Adjective

gross (comparative greesser, superlative greescht)

1. big, large

Derived terms

• Grossdaadi
• Grossmammi

Swedish

Etymology

From French grosse (douzaine), "large (dozen)"

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?r?s/

Noun

gross n

1. a gross, twelve dozen (144)

Declension

Related terms

• grosshandlare

See also

• dussin
• tjog

Anagrams

• sorgs

English

Etymology

From Middle English engrossen, from Anglo-Norman engrosser (“to gather in large quantities, draft something in final form”); partly from the phrase en gros (“in bulk, in quantity, at wholesale”), from en- + gros; and partly from Medieval Latin ingross? (“thicken, write something large and in bold lettering”, v.), from in- + grossus (“great, big, thick”), from Old High German gr?z (“big, thick, coarse”), from Proto-West Germanic *graut, from Proto-Germanic *grautaz (“large, great, thick, coarse grained, unrefined”), from Proto-Indo-European *ghrew?- (“to fell, put down, fall in”). More at in-, gross.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /?n?????s/, /???????s/, /?n?????s/, /???????s/
• (US) IPA^(key): /?n?????s/, /???????s/, /?n???o?s/, /?????o?s/
• Rhymes: -??s

Verb

engross (third-person singular simple present engrosses, present participle engrossing, simple past and past participle engrossed)

2. (transitive, now law) To write (a document) in large, aesthetic, and legible lettering; to make a finalized copy of.

   Coordinate term: longhand

   • 1846, Thomas De Quincey, “On Christianity, as an Organ of Political Movement”, in Tait’s Edinburgh Magazine:

     laws that may be engrossed upon a finger nail

3. (transitive, business, obsolete) To buy up wholesale, especially to buy the whole supply of (a commodity etc.).

   Synonym: corner the market

4. (transitive) To monopolize; to concentrate (something) in the single possession of someone, especially unfairly.
5. (transitive) To completely engage the attention of.
6. (transitive, obsolete) To thicken; to condense.

   Synonyms: inspissate; see also Thesaurus:thicken
7. (transitive, obsolete) To make gross, thick, or large; to thicken; to increase in bulk or quantity.
8. (obsolete) To amass.

   Synonyms: amound, hoard; see also Thesaurus:amass

Derived terms

• engrossing

Related terms

• gross

Translations

Further reading

• Douglas Harper (2001–2021) , “engross”, in Online Etymology Dictionary
• engrossing (law) on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

Anagrams

• Gersons, Gonsers, Songers, grossen, songers