Gross meaning of the word

English[edit]

Etymology[edit]

From Middle English gross (“whole, entire; flagrant, monstrous”), from Old French gros (“big, thick, large, stout”), from Late Latin grossus (“thick in diameter, coarse”), and Medieval Latin grossus (“great, big”), influenced by Old High German grōz (“big, thick, coarse”), from Proto-Germanic *grautaz (“large, great, thick, coarse grained, unrefined”), from Proto-Indo-European *gʰer- (“to rub, to stroke, to grind”).

Cognate with French grossier (“gross”). See also French dialectal grôt, groût (“large”) (Berry) and grô (“large”) (Burgundy), Catalan gros (“big”), Dutch groot (“big, large”), German groß (“large”), English great. More at great.

Pronunciation[edit]

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ɡɹəʊs/
• (US) IPA^(key): /ɡɹoʊs/
• (Philippine, nonstandard) IPA^(key): /ɡɹɔs/
• Homophone: Gross
• Rhymes: -əʊs, (Philippines) -ɒs

Adjective[edit]

gross (comparative grosser or more gross, superlative grossest or most gross)

2. (of behaviour considered to be wrong) Highly or conspicuously offensive.

   Synonyms: serious, flagrant, shameful, appalling, egregious.

   a gross mistake;  gross injustice;  gross negligence; a gross insult

   • 1595 December 9 (first known performance), William Shakespeare, “The life and death of King Richard the Second”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene 3]:

     Henry IV. My gracious uncle, let me know my fault:
     On what condition stands it and wherein?
     Edmund of Langley. Even in condition of the worst degree,
     In gross rebellion and detested treason:

   • 1682, Aphra Behn, The City-Heiress, London: D. Brown et al., Act IV, Scene 1, p. 40,^[1]

     Your very faults, how gross soere, to me

     Have something pleasing in ’em.

   • 1749, Henry Fielding, chapter 10, in The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling, volume (please specify |volume=I to VI), London: A[ndrew] Millar, […], →OCLC, book 18, page 336:

     […] I thank Heaven I have had Time to reflect on my past Life, where though I cannot charge myself with any gross Villainy, yet I can discern Follies and Vices too sufficient to repent and to be ashamed of;

   • 1813 January 27, [Jane Austen], Pride and Prejudice, volume (please specify |volume=I to III), London: […] [George Sidney] for T[homas] Egerton […], →OCLC:

     […] had his actions been what Wickham represented them, so gross a violation of every thing right could hardly have been concealed from the world;

   • 1908 October, Kenneth Grahame, chapter 6, in The Wind in the Willows, New York, N.Y.: Charles Scribner’s Sons, →OCLC:

     […] he has been found guilty, on the clearest evidence, first, of stealing a valuable motor-car; secondly, of driving to the public danger; and, thirdly, of gross impertinence to the rural police.

4. (of an amount) Excluding any deductions; including all associated amounts.

   Synonyms: whole, entire, overall, total, aggregate

   Antonym: net

   • c. 1596–1599 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Second Part of Henry the Fourth, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene i]:

     What is the gross sum that I owe thee?

   • 1878, Thomas Hardy, The Return of the Native, Book 6, Chapter 1,^[2]

     For a man of his habits the house and the hundred and twenty pounds a year which he had inherited from his mother were enough to supply all worldly needs. Resources do not depend upon gross amounts, but upon the proportion of spendings to takings.

   • 1937, George Orwell, The Road to Wigan Pier, Penguin, 1962, Part 1, Chapter 3, p. 37,^[3]

     […] please notice that even these wretched earnings are gross earnings. On top of this there are all kinds of stoppages which are deducted from the miner’s wages every week.

6. (sciences, pathology) Seen without a microscope (usually for a tissue or an organ); at a large scale; not detailed.

   Synonym: macroscopic

   Antonym: microscopic

   • 1962, Rachel Carson, Silent Spring, Boston: Houghton Mifflin, Chapter 12, p. 190,^[4]

     We are accustomed to look for the gross and immediate effect and to ignore all else. Unless this appears promptly and in such obvious form that it cannot be ignored, we deny the existence of hazard.

8. (slang, Canada, US, Australia) Causing disgust.

   Synonyms: disgusting, gro, grody, grotesque, grotty, nasty, revolting, yucky

   I threw up all over the bed. It was totally gross.

   • 1978, Armistead Maupin, Tales of the City, New York: Harper & Row, 1989, “Ties That Bind,” p. 293,^[5]

     Mary Ann spent her lunch hour at Hastings, picking out just the right tie for Norman. The hint might not be terribly subtle, she decided, but somebody had to do something about that gross, gravy-stained clip-on number.

   • 2002, Jeffrey Eugenides, Middlesex, New York: Picador, Book 3, p. 306,^[6]

     The next-door neighbor’s cat coughed up a hairball one day and the hair was not the cat’s. “That’s so gross!”

10. Lacking refinement in behaviour or manner; offending a standard of morality.

    Synonyms: coarse, rude, vulgar, obscene, impure

    • 1633, John Ford, ‘Tis Pity Shee’s a Whoore, page 498:

      Pog. Forsooth my Maister said that hee loved her almost as well as hee loved parmasent, and swore […] that shee wanted such a Nose as his was, to be as pretty a young woeman, as was any in Parma. Do. Oh grose!

    • 1777, Richard Brinsley Sheridan, The School for Scandal, Act I, Scene 1, ^[7]

      Verjuice. She certainly has Talents.

      Lady Sneerwell. But her manner is gross.

    • 1874: Dodsley et al., A Select Collection of Old English Plays

      But man to know God is a difficulty, except by a mean he himself inure, which is to know God’s creatures that be: at first them that be of the grossest nature, and then […] them that be more pure.

    • 1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter XII, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC:

      All this was extraordinarily distasteful to Churchill. It was ugly, gross. Never before had he felt such repulsion when the vicar displayed his characteristic bluntness or coarseness of speech. In the present connexion—or rather as a transition from the subject that started their conversation—such talk had been distressingly out of place.

11. (of a product) Lacking refinement; not of high quality.

    Synonyms: coarse, rough, unrefined

    Antonym: fine

    • 1944, Emily Carr, The House of All Sorts, “Lorenzo Was Registered,” ^[8]

      He scorned my wholesome kennel fare, toothing out dainties and leaving the grosser portions to be finished by the other dogs.

12. (of a person) Heavy in proportion to one’s height; having a lot of excess flesh.

    Synonyms: great, large, bulky, fat, obese

    • 1925, W. Somerset Maugham, The Painted Veil, London: Heinemann, 1934, Chapter 79,^[9]

      Kitty noticed that her sister’s pregnancy had blunted her features and in her black dress she looked gross and blousy.

    • 2013, Hilary Mantel, ‘Royal Bodies’, London Review of Books, 35.IV:

      He collected a number of injuries that stopped him jousting, and then in middle age became stout, eventually gross.

13. (now chiefly poetic) Difficult or impossible to see through.

    Synonyms: thick, heavy

    • 1594 (first publication), Christopher Marlow[e], The Trovblesome Raigne and Lamentable Death of Edvvard the Second, King of England: […], London: […] [Eliot’s Court Press] for Henry Bell, […], published 1622, →OCLC, (please specify the page):

      Couragious Lancaster, imbrace thy king,
      And as grosse vapours perish by the sunne,
      Euen so let hatred with thy soueraigne smile,

    • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Isaiah 60:2:

      For, behold, the darkness shall cover the earth, and gross darkness the people: but the Lord shall arise upon thee, and his glory shall be seen upon thee.

    • 1785, William Cowper, The Task, London: J. Johnson, Book 3, p. 116,^[10]

      A pestilent and most corrosive steam,

      Like a gross fog Boeotian, rising fast,

      And fast condensed upon the dewy sash,

      Asks egress;

    • 1870, James Russell Lowell, The Cathedral, Boston: Fields, Osgood, p. 34,^[11]

      […] a larger life

      Upon his own impinging, with swift glimpse

      Of spacious circles luminous with mind,

      To which the ethereal substance of his own

      Seems but gross cloud to make that visible,

      Touched to a sudden glory round the edge.

14. (archaic) Not sensitive in perception or feeling.

    Synonyms: dull, witless

    • c. 1587–1588, [Christopher Marlowe], Tamburlaine the Great. […] The First Part […], part 1, 2nd edition, London: […] [R. Robinson for] Richard Iones, […], published 1592, →OCLC; reprinted as Tamburlaine the Great (A Scolar Press Facsimile), Menston, Yorkshire; London: Scolar Press, 1973, →ISBN, Act II, scene vii:

      For he is groſſe and like the maſſie earth,
      That mooues not vpwards, nor by princely deeds
      Doth meane to ſoare aboue the highest ſort.

    • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Matthew 13:15:

      For this people’s heart is waxed gross, and their ears are dull of hearing, and their eyes they have closed; lest at any time they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears, and should understand with their heart, and should be converted, and I should heal them.

    • 1634 October 9 (first performance), [John Milton], H[enry] Lawes, editor, A Maske Presented at Ludlow Castle, 1634: […] [Comus], London: […] [Augustine Matthews] for Hvmphrey Robinson, […], published 1637, →OCLC; reprinted as Comus: […] (Dodd, Mead & Company’s Facsimile Reprints of Rare Books; Literature Series; no. I), New York, N.Y.: Dodd, Mead & Company, 1903, →OCLC:

      A thousand liveried Angels lacky her [the chaste soul],
      Driving far off each thing of sin and guilt,
      And in cleer dream, and solemn vision
      Tell her of things that no gross ear can hear.

15. (obsolete) Easy to perceive.

    Synonyms: obvious, clear

    • 1599, William Shakespeare, “The Life of Henry the Fift”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene ii]:

      […] though the truth of it stands off as gross
      As black and white, my eye will scarcely see it.

Synonyms[edit]

• (heavy in proportion to one’s height): See also Thesaurus:obese

Derived terms[edit]

• grossen
• grossish
• grossly

Translations[edit]

Noun[edit]

gross (countable and uncountable, plural gross or grosses)

1. Twelve dozen = 144.
2. The total nominal earnings or amount, before taxes, expenses, exceptions or similar are deducted. That which remains after all deductions is called net.
3. The bulk, the mass, the masses.

Translations[edit]

Verb[edit]

gross (third-person singular simple present grosses, present participle grossing, simple past and past participle grossed)

1. (transitive) To earn money, not including expenses.

   The movie grossed three million on the first weekend.

   • 2014 January 21, Hermione Hoby, “Julia Roberts interview for August: Osage County – ‘I might actually go to hell for this …’: Julia Roberts reveals why her violent, Oscar-nominated performance in August: Osage County made her feel ‘like a terrible person’ [print version: ‘I might actually go to hell for this …’ (18 January 2014, p. R4)]”, in The Daily Telegraph (Review)‎^[12]:

     The film grossed $464 million worldwide, ensconcing her in the Hollywood A-list.

Derived terms[edit]

[edit]

• engross
• grocer, grocery, groceries

Anagrams[edit]

• Sgros, Sorgs

German[edit]

Adjective[edit]

gross (strong nominative masculine singular grosser, comparative grösser, superlative am grössten)

1. Switzerland and Liechtenstein standard spelling of groß

Declension[edit]

Lombard[edit]

Etymology[edit]

From Late Latin grossus.

Adjective[edit]

gross

1. big, fat, large, thick

Pennsylvania German[edit]

Etymology[edit]

From Middle High German grōz, from Old High German grōz, from Proto-West Germanic *graut, from Proto-Germanic *grautaz.

Compare German groß, Dutch groot, English great.

Adjective[edit]

gross (comparative greesser, superlative greescht)

1. big, large

Derived terms[edit]

• Grossdaadi
• Grossmammi

Swedish[edit]

Etymology[edit]

From French grosse (douzaine), «large (dozen)».

Pronunciation[edit]

• IPA^(key): /ɡrɔs/

Noun[edit]

gross n

1. a gross, twelve dozen (144)

Declension[edit]

Declension of gross
	Singular	Plural
Indefinite	Definite	Indefinite	Definite
Nominative	gross	grosset	gross	grossen
Genitive	gross	grossets	gross	grossens

[edit]

• grosshandlare

See also[edit]

• dussin
• tjog

Anagrams[edit]

• sorgs

Recent Examples on the Web

Released in 2016, Super Mario Run grossed $60 million in its first year, while 2019’s Mario Kart Tour has generated $300 million (compared to Mario Kart 8’s $3 billion and counting).


—Ethan Shanfeld, Variety, 4 Apr. 2023




Fury of the Gods, playing in 926 domestic theaters and grossing $1.8 million. Want more movie news?


—Lester Fabian Brathwaite, EW.com, 2 Apr. 2023




The Miami original — the one that grossed $41 million in sales in 2022 — is 5,500 square feet smaller.


—Sarah Blaskovich, Dallas News, 30 Mar. 2023




But this bill more closely follows the format of 2016’s Desert Trip, which brought together Bob Dylan, the Rolling Stones, the Who, Paul McCartney, Neil Young and Roger Waters in what became the most lucrative music festival in U.S. history, grossing $160 million.


—August Brown, Los Angeles Times, 30 Mar. 2023




This installment of the report focuses on film, specifically the 200 highest-grossing English-language releases worldwide and the top 100 English-language original streaming movies as ranked by total U.S. household rating.


—Rebecca Sun, The Hollywood Reporter, 30 Mar. 2023




Joel has sold more than 1.5 million tickets and grossed in excess of $180 million from his MSG residency, which began in 2014 and has previously featured guest appearances by Olivia Rodrigo, Bruce Springsteen, John Fogerty, AC/DC’s Brian Johnson, Paul Simon, Miley Cyrus, and John Mellencamp.


—Jonathan Cohen, SPIN, 27 Mar. 2023




Related Madonna has performed in Nashville just once as part of a major tour — in 2016 on the Rebel Heart trek, selling out the Bridgestone Arena and grossing $1.5 million, according to Billboard Boxscore.


—Dave Brooks, Billboard, 27 Mar. 2023




The 2018 movie was an enormous success that grossed $911 million and won four Academy Awards, including Best Actor for star Rami Malek.


—Andy Greene, Rolling Stone, 24 Mar. 2023

The film was made for $3 million and turned into a modest hit, with a worldwide gross of $37 million and Oscar nominations for Mr. Fraser and Ms. Chau.


—Nicole Sperling, New York Times, 13 Mar. 2023




That movie went on to be one of the biggest box office draws out of the pandemic, heading to a worldwide gross of nearly $1.5 billion.


—Mia Galuppo, The Hollywood Reporter, 22 Feb. 2023




Produced by Yash Raj Films, the film shattered opening day records for a Hindi-language film, with a worldwide gross of $12.7 million on Jan. 25.


—Naman Ramachandran, Variety, 27 Jan. 2023




According to Deadline, the worldwide gross of Avatar: The Way of Water surpassed Furious 7 on Wednesday to become the 10th highest-grossing movie of all time.


—Jacob Siegal, BGR, 6 Jan. 2023




The last seven superhero films produced by Marvel Studios, Disney’s most-profitable film studio over the past decade, haven’t received release dates in the crucial China market, denting the global box-office gross.


—Robbie Whelan, WSJ, 23 Nov. 2022




The Puerto Rican reggaeton artist wrapped his most recent tour, El Último Tour del Mundo, at the FTX Arena in Miami on Sunday and raked in a whopping gross of $116 million from 575,000 tickets sold, according to a report from Billboard Boxscore.


—Kai Grady, Los Angeles Times, 7 Apr. 2022




Johansson argued that the streaming release cannibalized the theatrical gross, and violated her contract.


—NBC News, 1 Oct. 2021




The show has been a financial success with this cast — including, at one point, a record-beating weekly gross at the August Wilson Theatre of $2,062,739 for an eight-show week.


—Vulture, 2 Mar. 2023


See More

валовой, брутто, грубый, гросс, масса, получать чистый доход

прилагательное ↓

существительное ↓

глагол ↓

Словосочетания

common in gross — личное право выгона на чужом участке  
crude / gross distortion — грубое искажение  
gross earnings — большая прибыль  
a gross exaggeration — сильное преувеличение  
the gross vegetation of the tropical rain-forest — буйная растительность влажных тропических лесов  
gross blunder — грубая ошибка  
gross receipt — валовой доход  
gross value — валовая стоимость  
gross story — неприличный анекдот  
gross sale — оптовая продажа  

Примеры с переводом

Примеры, ожидающие перевода

Возможные однокоренные слова

engross  — поглощать, монополизировать, завладевать, писать крупными буквами
grossly  — грубо, чрезвычайно, вульгарно, крупно, оптовым путем, оптом

Формы слова

verb
I/you/we/they: gross
he/she/it: grosses
ing ф. (present participle): grossing
2-я ф. (past tense): grossed
3-я ф. (past participle): grossed

noun
ед. ч.(singular): gross
мн. ч.(plural): gross

adjective
срав. степ. (comparative): grosser
прев. степ. (superlative): grossest