Mass

Multiple Entries:
  Mass    mass    Mass.  

Concise Oxford English Dictionary © 2008 Oxford University Press:
Mass/mas/

▶noun the Christian Eucharist or Holy Communion, especially in the Roman Catholic Church.

■ a musical setting of parts of the liturgy used in the Mass.

– origin OE mæsse, from eccles. L. missa, from L. miss-, mittere ‘dismiss’, perh. from the last words of the service, Ite, missa est ‘Go, it is the dismissal’.

Concise Oxford English Dictionary © 2008 Oxford University Press:
mass/mas/

▶noun

• 1 a coherent body of matter with no definite shape.

  ■ any of the main portions in a painting that each have some unity in colour, lighting, etc.

• 2 a large number of people or objects gathered together: a mass of cyclists.

  ■ a large amount of material.

• 3 (the mass of) the majority of.

  ■ (the masses) the ordinary people.

• 4 Physics the quantity of matter which a body contains, as measured by its acceleration under a given force or by the force exerted on it by a gravitational field.

  ■ (in general use) weight.

▶adjective relating to, done by, or affecting large numbers of people or things: a mass exodus of refugees. ▶verb assemble or cause to assemble into a single body or mass.

– phrases
in mass as a body.
in the mass as a whole.

– derivatives
massless adjective,
massy adjective (literary).

– origin ME: from OFr. masse, from L. massa, from Gk maza ‘barley cake’.

Concise Oxford English Dictionary © 2008 Oxford University Press:
Mass.

▶abbreviation Massachusetts.