period

Noun

period (plural periods)

1. A length of time.
   • There was a period of confusion following the announcement.
   • You'll be on probation for a six-month period.
2. A length of time in history seen as a single coherent entity; an epoch, era.
   • Food rationing continued in the post-war period.
   • With some of it on the south and more of it on the north of the great main thoroughfare that connects Aldgate and the East India Docks, St. Bede's at this period of its history was perhaps the poorest and most miserable parish in the East End of London.1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter VII, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC

   Synonyms:

   vintage

3. (Canada, Philippines, US) The punctuation mark “.” (indicating the ending of a sentence or marking an abbreviation).
   • ‘You know, a period? The black spot at the end of a sentence — what do you call them over there?’2002, Zadie Smith, The Autograph Man, Penguin Books (2003), page 299

   Synonyms:

   point, full stop, dot, full-point, plain point

4. (figuratively) A decisive end to something; a stop.
   • My sufferings, physical and mental, are more than I can bear, and when such small arrangements as I have to make for your future well-being are completed it is my intention to put a period to them.1886 October – 1887 January, H[enry] Rider Haggard, She: A History of Adventure, London: Longmans, Green, and Co., published 1887, →OCLC
5. The length of time during which the same characteristics of a periodic phenomenon recur, such as the repetition of a wave or the rotation of a planet.
6. (euphemistic) Female menstruation; an episode of this.
   • When she is on her period, she prefers not to go swimming.
   1. (euphemistic) The set of symptoms associated with menstruation, even if not accompanied by menstruation; an episode of these symptoms.
7. A section of an artist's, writer's (etc.) career distinguished by a given quality, preoccupation etc.
   • This is one of the last paintings Picasso created during his Blue Period.
8. Each of the divisions into which a school day is split, allocated to a given subject or activity.
   • I have math class in second period.
9. Each of the intervals, typically three, of which a game is divided.
   • Gretzky scored in the last minute of the second period.
10. One or more additional intervals to decide a tied game, an overtime period.
    • They won in the first overtime period.
11. (obsolete) The length of time for a disease to run its course.
12. (archaic) An end or conclusion; the final point of a process, a state, an event, etc.
    • As thus all gazed on hir, so she glaunced hir lookes on all, surueying them as curiously, as they noted hir exactly, but at last she set downe her period on the face of Alexis […]1590, Robert Greene, “The Shepheards Tale”, in Greenes Mourning Garment, London: Thomas Newman, page 17
    • And if my death might make this island happy,
      And prove the period of their tyranny,
      I would expend it with all willingness:1591 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Second Part of Henry the Sixt, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies. […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and...

Adjective

period (not comparable)

1. Designating anything from a given historical era.
   • a period car
   • a period TV commercial
2. Evoking, or appropriate for, a particular historical period, especially through the use of elaborate costumes and scenery.
   • a period piece
   • As the guests arrived — there were about a hundred, a majority in period attire — I began to feel out of place in my beige summer suit, white shirt, and red necktie. Then I got over it. I certainly didn't suffer from Confederate-uniform envy.2004, Mark Singer, Somewhere in America, Houghton Mifflin, page 70
3. Menstrual.
   • period pains
   • period blood

Interjection

1. (Canada, US) That's final; that's the end of the matter (analogous to a period ending a sentence); end of story.
   • I know you don't want to go to the dentist, but your teeth need to be checked, period!
   • I'm the GOAT, point blank period!

   Synonyms:

   full stop, that's that, end of discussion

Verb

period (third-person singular simple present periods, present participle perioding, simple past and past participle perioded)

1. (intransitive, obsolete) To come to a period; to conclude.
   • For you may period upon this, that where there is the most pity for others, there is the greatest misery in the party pitied.1623, Owen Feltham, Resolves: Divine, Moral, Political
2. (obsolete, rare, transitive) To put an end to.
3. (colloquial) To menstruate; to excrete menstrual blood.