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.
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noun
A watch that is wound up by turning a small knob on a stem which holds a gear winding the mainspring.
Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract
No example sentence was provided for this meaning.
Synonyms: none provided
Antonyms: none provided
noun
A rousing speech, especially by a politician.
Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract
Usage: US
No example sentence was provided for this meaning.
Synonyms: none provided
Antonyms: none provided
noun
Someone who gives such speeches; a great orator.
Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract
Usage: US
No example sentence was provided for this meaning.
Synonyms: none provided
Antonyms: none provided
noun
A boring, interminable speech.
Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract
Usage: US, proscribed
No example sentence was provided for this meaning.
Synonyms: none provided
Antonyms: none provided
noun
Something top-notch or first-rate.
Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract
Usage: US, obsolete
No example sentence was provided for this meaning.
Synonyms: none provided
Antonyms: none provided
noun
a watch that is wound by turning a knob at the stem
Definition source: Princeton WordNet 3.0
No example sentence was provided for this meaning.
Synonyms: none provided
Antonyms: none provided
Broader terms: watch, ticker
History
US, mid-late 19th century, originally referring to then-recent stem-wind watches (invented in 1840s, commercialized initially 1850s by Patek Philippe & Co.). These were expensive, top-notch watches, hence generalized (1892) to “top-notch”, particularly applied to speeches, or to the orator in question. Non-speech senses later fell out of use. Nuance of “rousing” speech possibly by analogy with watch being wound up (“tighten by winding, excite, rouse”). Circa 2000, later sense of “interminable speech” a folk etymology, in sense “a speech that lasts so long one must wind one’s watch”.
