different between thorough vs entire

English

Alternative forms

• thoro (informal)

Etymology

From Middle English thoru?, þoru?, from Old English þuruh, a byform of Old English þurh, whence comes English through. The adjective derives from the preposition and adverb. The word developed a syllabic form in cases where the word was fully stressed: when it was used as an adverb, adjective, or noun, and less commonly when used as a preposition.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /?????/, /??????/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /????o?/, /????o?/
• (accents without the hurry–furry merger)
• (accents with the hurry–furry merger)
• Rhymes: -?r?

Adjective

thorough (comparative more thorough, superlative most thorough)

1. Painstaking and careful not to miss or omit any detail.

   The Prime Minister announced a thorough investigation into the death of a father of two in police custody.

   He is the most thorough worker I have ever seen.

   The infested house needs a thorough cleansing before it will be inhabitable.

2. Utter; complete; absolute.
   • 1925-29, Mahadev Desai (translator), M.K. Gandhi, The Story of My Experiments with Truth, Part I, chapter xviii^[1]:

     I was elected to the Executive Committee of the Vegetarian Society, and made it a point to attend every one of its meetings, but I always felt tongue-tied. Dr. Oldfield once said to me, 'You talk to me quite all right, but why is it that you never open your lips at a committee meeting? You are a drone.' I appreciated the banter. The bees are ever busy, the drone is a thorough idler. And it was not a little curious that whilst others expressed their opinions at these meetings, I sat quite silent. Not that I never felt tempted to speak. But I was at a loss to know how to express myself. All the rest of the members appeared to me to be better informed than I. Then it often happened that just when I had mustered up courage to speak, a fresh subject would be started. This went on for a long time.

Synonyms

• (detailed): comprehensive, rigorous, scrupulous; see also Thesaurus:meticulous or Thesaurus:comprehensive
• (utter; complete; absolute): downright, outright, unmitigated; see also Thesaurus:total

Derived terms

• thoroughbred
• thoroughgoing
• thoroughly
• thoroughness

Translations

Preposition

thorough

1. (obsolete) Through. [9th-19th c.]
   • 1599, William Shakespeare, Julius Caesar, V. i. 109:

     You are contented to be led in triumph / Thorough the streets of Rome?

Noun

thorough (plural thoroughs)

1. (Britain, dialect) A furrow between two ridges, to drain off the surface water.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Halliwell to this entry?)

English

Alternative forms

• intire (obsolete)

Etymology

From Middle English entere, enter, borrowed from Anglo-Norman entier, from Latin integrum, accusative of integer, from in- (“not”) + tang? (“touch”). Doublet of integer.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /?n?ta??/, /?n?ta??/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /?n?ta??/, /?n?ta??/
• Rhymes: -a??(?)

Adjective

entire (not comparable)

1. (sometimes postpositive) Whole; complete.
2. (botany) Having a smooth margin without any indentation.
3. (botany) Consisting of a single piece, as a corolla.
4. (complex analysis, of a complex function) Complex-differentiable on all of ?.
5. (of a male animal) Not gelded.
6. morally whole; pure; sheer
7. Internal; interior.

Derived terms

• entirety

Related terms

• integrity
• integrate

Translations

Noun

entire (countable and uncountable, plural entires)

1. (now rare) The whole of something; the entirety.
   • 1876, WE Gladstone, Homeric Synchronism:

     In the entire of the Poems we never hear of a merchant ship of the Greeks.

   • 1924, EM Forster, A Passage to India, Penguin 2005, p. 19:

     ‘Then is the City Magistrate the entire of your family now?’

2. An uncastrated horse; a stallion.
   • 2005, James Meek, The People's Act of Love (Canongate 2006, p. 124)

     He asked why Hijaz was an entire. You know what an entire is, do you not, Anna? A stallion which has not been castrated.

3. (philately) A complete envelope with stamps and all official markings: (prior to the use of envelopes) a page folded and posted.
4. Porter or stout as delivered from the brewery.

Translations

Anagrams

• entier, in-tree, nerite, triene