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definitions

partial

[pahr-shuhl]
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adjective

noun

Bridge. part-score.
Acoustics, Music. partial tone.

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RELATED WORDS

limited, one-sided, unfair, part, imperfect, sectional, partisan, colored, fractional, fragmentary, halfway, unfinished, uncompleted, discriminatory, disposed, influenced, interested, jaundiced, minded, predisposed

Nearby words

  1. parti pris,
  2. parti québécois,
  3. parti-,
  4. parti-colored,
  5. parti-coloured,
  6. partial agglutinin,
  7. partial antigen,
  8. partial denture,
  9. partial derivative,
  10. partial differential

Idioms

    partial to, having a liking or preference for; particularly fond of: I'm partial to chocolate cake.

Origin of partial

1375–1425; late Middle English parcial biased, particular < Middle French < Late Latin partiālis pertaining to a part, equivalent to Latin parti- (stem of pars) part + -ālis -al1
ANTONYMS FOR partial
1, 3. complete. 2. unbiased, fair.
SEE MORE ANTONYMS FOR partial ON THESAURUS.COM
Related forms
Can be confusedpartially partly
Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2019

Examples from the Web for partial

British Dictionary definitions for partial

partial

adjective

relating to only a part; not general or completea partial eclipse
biaseda partial judge
(postpositive foll by to) having a particular liking (for)
botany
  1. constituting part of a larger structurea partial umbel
  2. used for only part of the life cycle of a planta partial habitat
  3. (of a parasite) not exclusively parasitic
maths designating or relating to an operation in which only one of a set of independent variables is considered at a time

noun

Also called: partial tone music acoustics any of the component tones of a single musical sound, including both those that belong to the harmonic series of the sound and those that do not
maths a partial derivative
Derived Formspartially, adverbpartialness, noun

Word Origin for partial

C15: from Old French parcial, from Late Latin partiālis incomplete, from Latin pars part

xref

See partly
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
Word Origin and History for partial

partial

adj.

early 15c., "one-sided, biased," from Old French parcial (14c., Modern French partial), from Medieval Latin partialis "divisible, solitary, partial," from Latin pars (genitive partis) "part" (see part (n.)). Sense of "not whole, incomplete" is attested from late 14c. Related: Partially (mid-15c. as "incompletely").

Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper