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# hourglass

«hourglass» in Mova's school dictionary: **A glass timer with two bulbs joined by a narrow neck…** — its meaning for a pupil, its sense in the lessons and examples, with 3 sentences of Mova's corpora that use it.

### part of speech

noun (an hourglass, hourglasses)

### meaning for a pupil

1) A glass timer with two bulbs joined by a narrow neck, where sand runs from the top to the bottom in a set time. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/H/hourglass/#m1)

2) A shape narrow in the middle and wide at top and bottom, as in «an hourglass figure». [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/H/hourglass/#m2)

### sense in the lessons

In maths and science it is a way to measure time: a one-minute or three-minute sand timer. Board games use small ones. In stories an hourglass shows time running out. Phrases: hourglass shape, sand timer.

### examples

- Turn the hourglass over and start drawing. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/H/hourglass/#x1)
- When the sand runs out, your turn is over. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/H/hourglass/#x2)
- The wizard's hourglass was almost empty. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/H/hourglass/#x3)
- Our egg timer is a little three-minute hourglass. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/H/hourglass/#x4)
- A wasp has an hourglass shape. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/H/hourglass/#x5)
- Time ran out like sand in an hourglass. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/H/hourglass/#x6)

### note

Countable. «an hourglass» because the h is silent. Despite the name, many hourglasses measure minutes, not a full hour — check the time on it in a maths problem. It is not very exact compared with a clock.

### In the corpora

- [Some atoms are radioactive and slowly change into other atoms at a steady rate, like sand falling through an hourglass.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/geography/58-deep-time-and-the-story-of-life/3/)
- [An hourglass is a timer you can watch: sand falls through a narrow neck.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/122-clocks-before-clocks/7/)
- [An hourglass times with sand falling through a narrow neck; hourglasses became common in Europe about 700 years ago.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/122-clocks-before-clocks/18/)

### Trees and pragmatics

[Every meaning and example of «hourglass» parsed by Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/H/hourglass/), each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.