caliber
pronunciation
How to pronounce caliber in British English:
UK [ˈkælɪbə]
How to pronounce caliber in American English:
US [ˈkæləbər]
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- Noun:
- a degree or grade of excellence or worth
- diameter of a tube or gun barrel
Word Origin
- caliber (n.)
- 1560s, "degree of merit or importance," a figurative use from Middle French calibre (late 15c.), apparently ultimately from Arabic qalib "a mold for casting." Arabic also used the word in the sense "mold for casting bullets," which is the oldest literal meaning in English. Meaning "inside diameter of a gun barrel" is attested from 1580s. Barnhart remarks that Spanish calibre, Italian calibro "appear too late to act as intermediate forms" between the Arabic word and the French.
Example
- 1. Next to him sits the group 's thick-shouldered machine gunner , who mans a . 50 Caliber with a rusting barrel .
- 2. Perhaps the first thing that students notice about their college is the caliber of their fellow students .
- 3. Ben bernanke , a monetary economist of the highest caliber , denies it , while john taylor , an equally respected monetary economist , insists on it .
- 4. Though capable of measuring the world in various ways and to various ends-determining the caliber of projectiles , surveying land , aiding navigation-some of the instruments were never used , having been collected for the very purpose to which the franklin puts them today : display .
- 5. There seemed to be genuine joy that a man of such caliber has become a colleague of ours .