English Explanatory Dictionary

brief

English dictionary entry

Meanings

adj
  1. Of short duration; happening quickly.
  2. Concise; taking few words.
  3. Occupying a small distance, area or spatial extent; short.
  4. Rife; common; prevalent.
noun
  1. A writ summoning one to answer; an official letter or mandate.
  2. A short papal letter.
  3. An answer to any action.
  4. A memorandum of points of fact or of law for use in conducting a case.
  5. A position of interest or advocacy.
  6. An attorney's legal argument in written form for submission to a court.
  7. The material relevant to a case, delivered by a solicitor to the barrister who is counsel for the case.
  8. A barrister who is counsel for a party in a legal action.
  9. A short news story or report.
  10. Underwear briefs.
  11. Swimming briefs.
  12. A summary, précis or epitome; an abridgement or abstract.
verb
  1. To summarize a recent development to some person with decision-making power.
  2. To write a legal argument and submit it to a court.
adv
  1. Briefly.
  2. Soon; quickly.

Pronunciation

brēf /bɹiːf/ en-us-brief.ogg

Word forms

brief briefer more brief briefest most brief briefs briefing briefed

Etymology

From Middle English breef, breve, bref, from Old French brief, bref, from Latin brevis (“short”), from Proto-Indo-European *mréǵʰus (“short, brief”). Doublet of breve and merry.

Related words

brevi- brevitic brevity briefing

Derived words

briefen briefie briefish briefly briefness overbrief brief-bag briefcase briefless briefman briefs control brief counterbrief faggot brief in brief king's brief racing briefs sea brief swim brief watching brief briefable brief against debrief misbrief rebrief
This entry uses open data from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA/GFDL). Word forms are used for search and are not indexed as separate pages.
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