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First vs Prime - What's the difference?

first | prime | Synonyms |

Prime is a synonym of first.



In obsolete terms the difference between first and prime

is that first is time; time granted; respite while prime is the early morning.

As adjectives the difference between first and prime

is that first is preceding all others of a series or kind; the ordinal of one; earliest while prime is first in importance, degree, or rank.

As nouns the difference between first and prime

is that first is the person or thing in the first position while prime is one of the daily offices of prayer of the Western Church, associated with the early morning (typically 6 a.m.).

As an adverb first

is before anything else; firstly.

As a verb prime is

to prepare a mechanism for its main work.

first

English

(wikipedia first)

Etymology 1

From (etyl) (m), (m), (m), (m), from (etyl) (m), .

Alternative forms

* firste (archaic) * fyrst (obsolete) * fyrste (obsolete)

Adjective

(-)
  • Preceding all others of a series or kind; the ordinal of one; earliest.
  • *
    • , title=(The Celebrity), chapter=2 , passage=Sunning himself on the board steps, I saw for the first time Mr. Farquhar Fenelon Cooke. He was dressed out in broad gaiters and bright tweeds, like an English tourist, and his face might have belonged to Dagon, idol of the Philistines.}}
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2013-08-03, volume=408, issue=8847, magazine=(The Economist)
    • , title= Yesterday’s fuel , passage=The dawn of the oil age was fairly recent. Although the stuff was used to waterproof boats in the Middle East 6,000 years ago, extracting it in earnest began only in 1859 after an oil strike in Pennsylvania. The first barrels of crude fetched $18 (around $450 at today’s prices).}}
  • Most eminent or exalted; most excellent; chief; highest.
  • * 1784 : William Jones, The Description and Use of a New Portable Orrery, &c. , PREFACE
    • THE favourable reception the Orrery has met with from Per?ons of the fir?t di?tinction, and from Gentlemen and Ladies in general, has induced me to add to it ?everal new improvements in order to give it a degree of Perfection; and di?tingui?h it from others; which by Piracy, or Imitation, may be introduced to the Public.
    Alternative forms
    * ; (in names of monarchs and popes) I

    Adverb

    (-)
  • Before anything else; firstly.
  • * , chapter=8
    • , title= Mr. Pratt's Patients , passage=That concertina was a wonder in its way. The handles that was on it first was wore out long ago, and he'd made new ones of braided rope yarn. And the bellows was patched in more places than a cranberry picker's overalls.}}
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2013-06-29, volume=407, issue=8842, page=29, magazine=(The Economist)
    • , title= Unspontaneous combustion , passage=Since the mid-1980s, when Indonesia first began to clear its bountiful forests on an industrial scale in favour of lucrative palm-oil plantations, “haze” has become an almost annual occurrence in South-East Asia.}}

    Noun

  • (uncountable) The person or thing in the first position.
  • * 1699 , , Heads designed for an essay on conversations
    • Study gives strength to the mind; conversation, grace: the first apt to give stiffness, the other suppleness: one gives substance and form to the statue, the other polishes it.
  • (uncountable) The first gear of an engine.
  • (countable) Something that has never happened before; a new occurrence.
  • (countable, baseball) first base
  • (countable, British, colloquial) A first-class honours degree.
  • (countable, colloquial) A first-edition copy of some publication.
  • A fraction of an integer ending in one.

    • Derived terms

    * feet first * firstborn * first-class * first gear * first imperative (Latin grammar) * first of all * first place * first things first * first up

    See also

    * primary

    Etymology 2

    From (etyl) (m), (m), (m), from (etyl) (m), (m), . See also (l).

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • (obsolete) Time; time granted; respite.

    • Statistics

    *

    Anagrams

    * * 100 English basic words English locatives English sequence adverbs English ordinal numbers 1000 English basic words

    prime

    English

    Etymology 1

    From (etyl) prime, from (etyl) .

    Adjective

    (-)
  • First in importance, degree, or rank.
    • Our prime concern here is to keep the community safe.
  • First in time, order, or sequence
    • Both the English and French governments established prime meridians in their capitals.
  • * Tennyson
    • prime forests
  • * Milton
    • She was not the prime cause, but I myself.
  • First in excellence, quality, or value.
    • This is a prime location for a bookstore.
  • (mathematics, lay) Having exactly two integral factors: itself and unity (1 in the case of integers).
    • Thirteen is a prime number.
  • (mathematics, technical) Such that if it divides a product, it divides one of the multiplicands.
  • (mathematics) Having its complement closed under multiplication: said only of ideals.
  • Marked or distinguished by the prime symbol.
  • Early; blooming; being in the first stage.
  • * Milton
    • His starry helm, unbuckled, showed him prime / In manhood where youth ended.
  • (obsolete) Lecherous; lustful; lewd.
    • (Shakespeare)
    Synonyms
    * greatest, most important, main, primary, principal, top * excellent, top quality * earliest, first, original * (having no nontrivial factors) indivisible * (dividing a factor of any product it divides) *
    Related terms
    * secondary * tertiary

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • (Christianity, historical) One of the daily offices of prayer of the Western Church, associated with the early morning (typically 6 a.m.).
  • * Spenser
    • Early and late it rung, at evening and at prime .
  • (obsolete) The early morning.
  • * 1590 , (Edmund Spenser), (The Faerie Queene) , I.vi:
    • They all as glad, as birdes of ioyous Prime
  • The earliest stage of something.
  • * Hooker
    • in the very prime of the world
  • * Waller
    • Hope waits upon the flowery prime .
  • The most active, thriving, or successful stage or period.
  • * Eustace
    • cut off in their prime
  • * Dryden
    • the prime of youth
  • * {{quote-news, year=2012, date=April 29, author=Nathan Rabin
    • , title= TV: Review: THE SIMPSONS (CLASSIC): “Treehouse of Horror III” (season 4, episode 5; originally aired 10/29/1992) , passage=And it’s daunting because each segment has to tell a full, complete story in something like six minutes while doing justice to revered source material and including the non-stop laughs and genius gags that characterized The Simpsons in its god-like prime .}}
  • * 1965 , (Bob Dylan), (Like a Rolling Stone)
    • Once upon a time you dressed so fine. You threw the bums a dime in your prime , didn’t you?
  • The chief or best individual or part.
  • * Jonathan Swift
    • Give him always of the prime .
  • (music) The first note or tone of a musical scale.
  • (fencing) The first defensive position, with the sword hand held at head height, and the tip of the sword at head height.
  • (algebra, number theory) A prime element of a mathematical structure, particularly a prime number.
  • * {{quote-magazine, year=2013, month=July-August, author= Sarah Glaz
    • , title= Ode to Prime Numbers , volume=101, issue=4, magazine=(American Scientist) , passage=Some poems, echoing the purpose of early poetic treatises on scientific principles, attempt to elucidate the mathematical concepts that underlie prime numbers. Others play with primes’' cultural associations. Still others derive their structure from mathematical patterns involving ' primes .}}
  • (card games) A four-card hand containing one card of each suit in the game of primero; the opposite of a flush in poker.
  • (backgammon) Six consecutive blocks, which prevent the opponent's pieces from passing.
  • The symbol
  • (chemistry, obsolete) Any number expressing the combining weight or equivalent of any particular element; so called because these numbers were respectively reduced to their lowest relative terms on the fixed standard of hydrogen as 1.
  • An inch, as composed of twelve seconds in the duodecimal system.
    • Synonyms
    * bloom, blossom, efflorescence, flower, flush, heyday, peak * (chief or best individual or part) choice, prize, quality, select * prime number (when an integer)
    Derived terms
    (algebra) * cousin prime * primality * prime constellation * prime number * sexy prime * twin prime

    Etymology 2

    Origin uncertain; perhaps related to primage.

    Verb

    (prim)
  • To prepare a mechanism for its main work.
    • You'll have to press this button twice to prime the fuel pump.
  • To apply a coat of primer paint to.
    • I need to prime these handrails before we can apply the finish coat.
  • (obsolete) To be renewed.
  • * Quarles
    • Night's bashful empress, though she often wane, / As oft repeats her darkness, primes again.
  • To serve as priming for the charge of a gun.
  • (of a steam boiler) To work so that foaming occurs from too violent ebullition, which causes water to become mixed with, and be carried along with, the steam that is formed.
  • To apply priming to (a musket or cannon); to apply a primer to (a metallic cartridge).
  • To prepare; to make ready; to instruct beforehand; to coach.
    • to prime a witness
    The boys are primed for mischief.
    (Thackeray)
  • (UK, dialect, obsolete) To trim or prune.
    • to prime trees
  • (math) To mark with a prime mark.
    • Synonyms
    * (to apply a coat of primer paint to) ground, undercoat

    Derived terms

    * primer

    Related terms

    * primal * primary * primate * Primates * primy

    See also

    * prime contract * prime decomposition * prime factorization * prime number * pseudoprime

    References

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