Afternoon

/ˌɑːf.təˈnuːn/ · noun

Meaning

The part of the day from noon or lunchtime until sunset, evening, or suppertime or 6pm..

Definitions by Sense

1. The part of the day from noon or lunchtime until sunset, evening, or suppertime or 6pm.
2. (figuratively) The later part of anything, often with implications of decline.
3. (informal) A party or social event held in the afternoon.
4. (archaic in the singular) In the afternoon.
5. Ellipsis of good afternoon.

Example Sentences

Theſe men ſerue God in the forenoone, and the diuell in the after noone;

The Celebrity, by arts unknown, induced Mrs. Judge Short and two other ladies to call at Mohair on a certain afternoon when Mr. Cooke was trying a trotter on the track. The three returned wondering and charmed with Mrs. Cooke; they were sure she had had no hand in the furnishing of that atrocious house.

If the afternoon was fine they strolled together in the park, very slowly, and with pauses to draw breath wherever the ground sloped upward. The slightest effort made the patient cough. He would stand leaning on his stick and holding a hand to his side, and when the paroxysm had passed it left him shaking.

Here the stripped panelling was warmly gold and the pictures, mostly of the English school, were mellow and gentle in the afternoon light.

And I love to live so pleasantly/Live this life of luxury/Lazing on a sunny afternoon/In the summertime

For several days, Mr. Sammler returning on the customary bus late afternoons from the Forty-second Street Library had been watching a pickpocket at work […] Mr. Sammler if he had not been a tall straphanger would not with his one good eye have seen these things happening.

We all sat in stuffy classrooms and had men in tweedy sportscoats ruin our afternoons.

Buck.[…]Theſe both put by a poore petitioner A care-crazd mother of a many children, A beauty-waining and diſtreſſed widow, Euen in the afternoone of her beſt daies Made priſe and purchaſe of his luſtfull eye, Seduc t the pitch and height of al his thoughts, To baſe declenſion and loathd bigamie, By her in his vnlawfull bed he got.

Synonyms for afternoon

Antonyms for afternoon

Related Words

Word Forms

• afternoons
• afternoone

Usage Notes

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