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meia

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary

Portuguese

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Alternative forms

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Pronunciation

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  • (Brazil) IPA(key): /ˈmej.ɐ/ [ˈmeɪ̯.ɐ]
    • (Southern Brazil) IPA(key): /ˈmej.a/ [ˈmeɪ̯.a]
 

  • Rhymes: -ejɐ, (Portugal) -ɐjɐ
  • Hyphenation: mei‧a
  • Audio (Brazil):(file)

Etymology 1

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From Old Galician-Portuguese meya, from Latin media, feminine of medius (middle; half), from Proto-Indo-European *medʰyo- (between). Doublet of média.

Noun

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meia f (plural meias)

  1. sock (covering for the foot; originally short form of meia-calça)
    Synonyms: (Rio Grande do Sul) carpim, (Portugal) peúga
  2. (Brazil) Ellipsis of meia-entrada. (a ticket sold for half its normal price, as required by law, for students and children)
    Synonym: meia-entrada
  3. (Portugal, historical) obsolete unit of measure for liquids, equivalent to six pints
  4. (when reading a time) half past (short form of meia hora)
    O evento termina às três e meia.
    The event ends at half past three.
Derived terms
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Noun

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meia m or f by sense (plural meias)

  1. (Brazil, soccer) midfielder
    Synonyms: (Portugal) médio, meio-campista

Adjective

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meia

  1. feminine singular of meio
Descendants
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  • Kadiwéu: meeya
  • Macanese: mea

Adverb

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meia

  1. (hypercorrect) Misconstruction of meio
    Estou *meia cansada.I'm a bit tired.
Usage notes
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  • The word meia, as an adverb, appears in vulgar speech because of a confusion about the role of meio. In this case, whenever meio, as an adverb, lies right before a feminine adjective, it is confused for an adjective as well, hence hypercorrected into the feminine declension meia. In standard speech, however, Portuguese adverbs are never inflected by grammatical gender.

Numeral

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meia

  1. (Brazil) six (6, used instead of seis when it’s necessary to avoid confusion with rhyme três; ellipsis of meia dúzia.)
    Synonyms: meia-dúzia, seis

Further reading

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Etymology 2

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See the etymology of the corresponding lemma form.

Verb

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meia

  1. inflection of mear:
    1. third-person singular present indicative
    2. second-person singular imperative