HOGSHEAD

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does hogshead mean? 

• HOGSHEAD (noun)
  The noun HOGSHEAD has 2 senses:

1. a British unit of capacity for alcoholic beverages

2. a large cask especially one holding 63 gals

  Familiarity information: HOGSHEAD used as a noun is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• HOGSHEAD (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

A British unit of capacity for alcoholic beverages

Classified under:

Nouns denoting quantities and units of measure

Hypernyms ("hogshead" is a kind of...):

British capacity unit; Imperial capacity unit (a unit of measure for capacity officially adopted in the British Imperial System; British units are both dry and wet)

Meronyms (parts of "hogshead"):

barrel; bbl (any of various units of capacity)

Sense 2

Meaning:

A large cask especially one holding 63 gals

Classified under:

Nouns denoting man-made objects

Hypernyms ("hogshead" is a kind of...):

barrel; cask (a cylindrical container that holds liquids)

 Context examples 

They brought me a second hogshead, which I drank in the same manner, and made signs for more; but they had none to give me.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

“Fill up your stoups!” cried Black Simon, thrusting his own goblet into the open hogshead in front of him.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

We had gone on the May Day for a round voyage of seven days, but a hogshead got loose and started one of our plates, so that we had to put back into port for twelve hours.

(The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

At every man's elbow stood his leathern blackjack of beer, while at the further end a hogshead with its end knocked in promised an abundant supply for the future.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

She drank out of a golden cup, above a hogshead at a draught.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

Behind the hogshead, on a half circle of kegs, boxes, and rude settles, sat Aylward, John, Black Simon and three or four other leading men of the archers, together with Goodwin Hawtayne, the master-shipman, who had left his yellow cog in the river to have a last rouse with his friends of the Company.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)