Standard Lemma guide
Definitions and examples are grouped by meaning. Pronunciation, history, word forms, translations, descendants, synonyms, antonyms, derived terms, and related words appear whenever the source provides them.
Sound
Each Play button uses your device's default local English voice, or a natural local fallback. The selected voice name appears after playback. This is synthesized speech, not a source recording.
noun
Spectacles that have corrective lenses of two different powers; used by people who need both distance and reading glasses.
Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract
Usage: plural, plural-only
No example sentence was provided for this meaning.
Synonyms: none provided
Antonyms: none provided
noun
eyeglasses having two focal lengths, one for near vision and the other for far vision
Definition source: Princeton WordNet 3.0
No example sentence was provided for this meaning.
Synonyms: none provided
Antonyms: none provided
Broader terms: spectacles, specs, eyeglasses, glasses
History
From bi- + focal (see focus), coined in 1824 by John Isaac Hawkins, inventor of trifocals. When the concept of bifocals was originally conceived by Benjamin Franklin, he called them double spectacles.
Across languages
8 source translations are retained for this English entry.
