26-letter words containing e, t, h, a, n, o
- to bring something to bear — If you bring something to bear on a situation, you use it to deal with that situation.
- to call something your own — If you have something you can call your own, it belongs only to you, rather than being controlled by or shared with someone else.
- to catch hold of something — Hold is used in expressions such as grab hold of, catch hold of, and get hold of, to indicate that you close your hand tightly around something, for example to stop something moving or falling.
- to come to a grinding halt — If you say that something comes to a grinding halt, you are emphasizing that it stops very suddenly, especially before it was meant to.
- to have your two penn'orth — during a discussion about something, if you have your two penn'orth or put in your two penn'orth, you add your own opinion
- to hold someone for ransom — If a kidnapper is holding a person for ransom, they keep that person prisoner until they are given what they want.
- to laugh in someone's face — If someone laughs in your face, they are openly disrespectful towards you.
- to lay oneself open to sth — If you lay yourself open to criticism or attack, or if something lays you open to it, something you do makes it possible or likely that other people will criticize or attack you.
- to pip someone at the post — If someone is pipped at the post or pipped to the post they are just beaten in a competition or in a race to achieve something.
- to preach to the converted — If you say that someone is preaching to the converted, you mean that they are wasting their time because they are trying to persuade people to think or believe in things that they already think or believe in.
- to rub salt into the wound — If someone or something rubs salt into the wound, they make the unpleasant situation that you are in even worse, often by reminding you of your failures or faults.
- to see the back of someone — If you say that you will be glad to see the back of someone, you mean that you want them to leave.
- to spare someone's blushes — If you spare someone's blushes or save someone's blushes, you avoid doing or saying something that will embarrass them.
- to steal someone's thunder — If you steal someone's thunder, you get the attention or praise that they thought they would get, usually by saying or doing what they had intended to say or do.
- to take sb to the cleaners — If someone takes you to the cleaners, they unfairly take most of your money, for example in a business deal or in gambling.
- to throw down the gauntlet — If you throw down the gauntlet to someone, you say or do something that challenges them to argue or compete with you.
- triple combination therapy — treatment with three different drugs
- turn something on its head — to treat or present something in a completely new and different way
- turn the tables on someone — to cause a complete reversal of circumstances, esp to defeat or get the better of someone who was previously in a stronger position
- two sides of the same coin — opposite but connected ideas
- walther von der vogelweide — c1170–c1230, German minnesinger and poet.
- what someone is driving at — If you ask someone what they are driving at, you are asking what they are trying to say or what they are saying indirectly.
- wilcoxon mann-whitney test — a statistical test of the difference between the distributions of data collected in two experimental conditions applied to unmatched groups of subjects but comparing the distributions of the ranks of the scores
- with one's nose in the air — haughtily
- within range, out of range — If something is in range or within range, it is near enough to be reached or detected. If it is out of range, it is too far away to be reached or detected.
- won't/wouldn't hear of sth — If you say that you won't hear of someone doing something, you mean that you refuse to let them do it.
- zermelo fränkel set theory — (mathematics) A set theory with the axioms of Zermelo set theory (Extensionality, Union, Pair-set, Foundation, Restriction, Infinity, Power-set) plus the Replacement axiom schema: If F(x,y) is a formula such that for any x, there is a unique y making F true, and X is a set, then {F x : x in X} is a set. In other words, if you do something to each element of a set, the result is a set. An important but controversial axiom which is NOT part of ZF theory is the Axiom of Choice.