hearthful

Etymology

Definitions

1. 1

   The amount a fireplace can hold.

   • All furnaces were built with two sumps, wells or forehearths in which the molten aluminum accumulated, one hearthful or about two metric tons at a time.
   • They sawed and hacked and somehow managed to acquire hearthfuls of fuel to see them through.
2. 2

   A quantity (of something) contained within a fireplace.

   • Shortly before Thanksgiving, oil prices and expectations rising apace, I had accumulated a healthy hearthful of ashes which I painstakingly distributed on my lawn.
   • Give me refuge, o hearthsful of fire
3. 3

   A quantity (of something) sitting on a hearth outside a fireplace.

   • And if gunning over an intelligent handsome setter enriches my sport, certainly a hearthful of them on a winter evening or speckled faces peering out of our station wagon are things to value.
   • Of the company, one was on the ground insensible; another was in a yet more deplorable condition; another was nodding over a hearthful of battered pots, pieces of pipes, and oozings of ale.
4. ›+ 2 more definitionsshow fewer

   1. 4

      A homeful

      A homeful; enough to fill a cosy domestic situation.

      • I did not leave you when I was young and how can I quit now that we are the parents of a hearthful of children?
   2. 5

      Characterized by warmth, comfort, and a sense of belonging

      Characterized by warmth, comfort, and a sense of belonging; cosy.

      • Thus for some people in settings such as squats and the street, lower on the physical continuum than the others, their experiences may be hearthful: the psychological, social and symbolical constituents of home.
      • The spot in Hillsdale County chosen by Mr. Jones was sightly and hearthful, watered by the St. Joseph River, and thickly wooded.

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