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mother of

  1. The best or greatest of a type, as in That was the mother of all tennis matches. This expression originated during the Gulf War as a translation of Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein's term umm al-ma'arik, for “major battle”; the Arabic “mother of” is a figure of speech for “major” or “best.” It was quickly adopted and applied to just about any person, event, or activity. [Slang; late 1980s]



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Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

It is possible that the mother of Baby P, who died after months of abuse, has been "deceiving" a parole board panel regarding her efforts to change, a psychologist has told the hearing.

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Soon afterwards, Belinda Sullivan, the mother of Kyrees, posted on Facebook to appeal for calm, adding that her son's body was still on the side of the road.

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"We're leaving Abidjan a week before the vote," Ahoua Diomande, a mother of two, told the BBC.

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The political gridlock worries Amber, a mother of two children and human resources worker for the US Army.

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The mother of the 16-year-old boy being attacked in the video told local online publication, News24, that her son had had cancer and had completed his chemotherapy earlier this year.

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Mother Naturemother of coal