holeful
English
Etymology 1
hole + -ful
Noun
holeful (plural holefuls or holesful)
- As much as fills a hole.
- 1956, Flannery O'Connor, “Greenleaf”, in The Kenyon Review, volume 18, number 3, page 408:
- At this very instant while she was recalling a lifetime of work, Mr. Greenleaf was loitering in the woods and Mrs. Greenleaf was probably flat on the ground, asleep over her holeful of clippings.
- 1966, E. L. Doctorow, Big as Life, page 21:
- When Red and the professor got out to slide the heavy disk back into place they discovered a holeful of angry, baleful eyes looking up at them.
- 1988, Muriel Marshall, Red Hole in Time, page 240:
- One of the women was down washing clothes in that holeful of water.
- 2014, S. Dorman, Maine Metaphor: The Green and Blue House, →ISBN:
- Serene Pugwash Pond was a three acre holeful of water, having been formed in loose till by a chunk of ice left in the wake of receding glaciers.
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Etymology 2
hole + -ful
Adjective
holeful (comparative more holeful, superlative most holeful)
- Filled with holes; holey.
- 1925, Eustace Clare Grenville Murray, Strange Tales, page 18:
- When at last Mr. Alderman Flapp emerged, swathed in a comforter and in a flowing self-consciousness of equity, Mr. Flipp approached on the tips of his holeful boots, and whispered, "I am the dirty crossing-man; are you the dirty crossing-boy?" — and in another moment they were locked in each others' arms.
- 1989, Vidya Dehejia, Edward Lear, Allen Staley, Impossible Picturesqueness: Edward Lear's Indian Watercolours, 1873-1875, page 66-67:
- Much of this squary-holeful architecture, seems to me clumsy and dwarfy, full of the defects of Egyptian buildings but wanting their grandeur.
- 1992, Writers Advisory Services International - Volume 3, Issue 3, page 81:
- A body covered by a holeful rag Shoots out an odour more unwelcome Than the one of cattle dung grund
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