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Few

few (English)

Etymology

From - fewe||few|lang=enm, from - feaw|fēawa, fēawe, fēa|few|lang=ang, from - fawaz|few|lang=en, from - paw-|few, small|lang=en. Cognate with - -

Persiska - fā

Engelska - poor

Pronunciation

- /fjuː/,

/fju:/

- /fju/,

/fju/

en-us-few.ogg

- Audio (UK)

Rhymes: uː

Determiner

preceded by another determiner

An indefinite, but usually small, number of.

I was expecting lots of people at the party, but very few (=almost none) turned up.

Quite a few of them (=many of them) were pleasantly surprised.

I don't know how many drinks I've had, but I've had a few. This usage is likely ironic.

used alone

Not many; a small (in comparison with another number stated or implied) but somewhat indefinite number of.

There are few people who understand quantum theory.

Many are called, but few are chosen.

of clouds

(US?) Obscuring one eighth to two eighths of the sky.

Tonight.. A few clouds. Increasing cloudiness overnight.

NOAA definition of the term "few clouds": An official sky cover classification for aviation weather observations, descriptive of a sky cover of 1/8 to 2/8. This is applied only when obscuring phenomenon aloft are present--that is, not when obscuring phenomenon are surface-based, such as fog.

of rainfall with regard to a location

(US?) Having a 10 percent chance of measurable precipitation (0.01 inch); used interchangeably with isolated.

Usage notes

- Few is used with plural nouns only; its synonymous counterpart

little

is used with Appendix:Glossary#uncountable|uncountable nouns.

Although indefinite in nature, a few is usually more than two (two often being referred to as "a couple of"), and less than "several". If the sample population is say between 5 and 20, a few would mean three or four, but no more than this. However, if the population sample size were in the millions, "a few" could refer to several hundred items. In other words, few in this context means a very very small percentage but way over the 3 or 4 usually ascribed to it its use with much much smaller numbers.

- Few is grammatically affirmative but semantically negative, and it can license negative_polarity_items. For example, lift_a_finger usually cannot be used in affirmative sentences, but can be used in sentences with - few.

: He didn't lift a finger to help us.

: *He lifted a finger to help us. (ungrammatical)

: Few people lifted a finger to help us.

: *A few people lifted a finger to help us. (ungrammatical)

: *Fewer people lifted a finger to help us. (ungrammatical)

References

Meteorology (both senses)

: NOAA Glossary: f

Translations

indefinite, usually small number

Albanska - pak

Arabiska - قليلا