some

Alternative forms

• som (obsolete)
• som' (dialect)
• sum (AAVE)

Etymology

From Middle English som, sum, from Old English sum (“some, a certain one”), from Proto-West Germanic *sum, from Proto-Germanic *sumaz (“some, a certain one”), from Proto-Indo-European *sem- (“one, whole”). Cognate Scots sum, some (“some”), North Frisian som, sam, säm (“some”), West Frisian sommige, somlike (“some”), dialectal Dutch som, saom (“some”), standard Dutch sommige (“some”), Low German somige (“some”), German dialectal summige (“some”), Danish somme (“some”), Swedish somlig (“some”), Norwegian sum, som (“some”), Icelandic sumur (“some”), Gothic 𐍃𐌿𐌼𐍃 (sums, “one, someone”). More at same.

Pronunciation

• (UK)
  • (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /sʌm/, [sɐm]
  • (Northern England) IPA^(key): /sʊm/

  • Audio (Received Pronunciation):

    (file)

• (US)
  • (General American) enPR: sŭm, IPA^(key): /sʌm/, [sɐm]

  • Audio (US):

    (file)

  • IPA^(key): /səm/ (unstressed)
• (General Australian, New Zealand) IPA^(key): /sɐm/, [säm]
• Homophone: sum
• Rhymes: -ʌm

Pronoun

some

1. A certain number, at least two.

   Some enjoy spicy food, others prefer it milder.

   • 2013 July 19, Timothy Garton Ash, “Where Dr Pangloss meets Machiavelli”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 189, number 6, page 18:

     Hidden behind thickets of acronyms and gorse bushes of detail, a new great game is under way across the globe. Some call it geoeconomics, but it's geopolitics too. The current power play consists of an extraordinary range of countries simultaneously sitting down to negotiate big free trade and investment agreements.

2. An indefinite quantity.

   Can I have some of them?

3. An indefinite amount, a part.

   Please give me some of the cake.

   Everyone is wrong some of the time.

Determiner

some

1. (stressed form) A nonzero, unspecified proportion of (a bounded set of countable things): at least two.

   Antonyms: zero, no; a lot of, many, numerous; countless

   Hypernyms: multiple, various

   Hyponyms: a few, a couple of, a handful of

   Coordinate term: one

   Near-synonym: any

   Some people like camping.

   • 2006, Charles H Lippy, Faith in America [Three Volumes] [3 Volumes]: Changes, Challenges, New Directions, Greenwood Publishing Group, →ISBN, page 73:

     Many people, especially some evangelical Christians, have been less than optimistic about the Potter influence.

   • 2013 July 20, “The attack of the MOOCs”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8845:

     Since the launch early last year of […] two Silicon Valley start-ups offering free education through MOOCs, massive open online courses, the ivory towers of academia have been shaken to their foundations. University brands built in some cases over centuries have been forced to contemplate the possibility that information technology will rapidly make their existing business model obsolete.

   • 2013 July-August, Sarah Glaz, “Ode to Prime Numbers”, in American Scientist, volume 101, number 4:

     Some poems, echoing the purpose of early poetic treatises on scientific principles, attempt to elucidate the mathematical concepts that underlie prime numbers. Others play with primes’ cultural associations. Still others derive their structure from mathematical patterns involving primes.

2. A nonzero, unspecified quantity or number of (an unbounded set of countable things).

   Antonyms: zero, no; a lot of, many, numerous; countless

   Hypernyms: multiple, various

   Hyponyms: a few, a couple of, a handful of

   Coordinate term: one

   Near-synonym: any

   Would you like some grapes?

   • 1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter IV, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC, pages 58–59:

     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. […] Their example was followed by others at a time when the master of Mohair was superintending in person the docking of some two-year-olds, and equally invisible.

   • 1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter XLIV, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC, page 364:

     In the autumn there was a row at some cement works about the unskilled labour men. A union had just been started for them and all but a few joined. One of these blacklegs was laid for by a picket and knocked out of time.

3. An unspecified amount of (something uncountable).

   Antonyms: zero, no

   Hyponyms: a little, a lot of, much

   Near-synonym: any

   Would you like some water?

   After some persuasion, he finally agreed.

   • 1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter XVI, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC, pages 130–131:

     It was a joy to snatch some brief respite, jump upon a tram, and find himself in the rectory drawing–room. Listening here was as pleasant as talking; just to watch was pleasant. The young priests who lived here wore cassocks and birettas; their faces were fine and mild, yet really strong, like the rector's face; and in their intercourse with him and his wife they seemed to be brothers.

4. (stressed form) A certain, an unspecified or unknown.

   I've just met some guy who said he knew you.

   The sequence S converges to zero for some initial value v.

   • 1921, Ben Travers, chapter 4, in A Cuckoo in the Nest, Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, Page & Company, published 1925, →OCLC:

     By some paradoxical evolution rancour and intolerance have been established in the vanguard of primitive Christianity. Mrs. Spoker, in common with many of the stricter disciples of righteousness, was as inclement in demeanour as she was cadaverous in aspect.

   • 2013 June 14, Jonathan Freedland, “Obama's once hip brand is now tainted”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 189, number 1, page 18:

     Where we once sent love letters in a sealed envelope, or stuck photographs of our children in a family album, now such private material is despatched to servers and clouds operated by people we don't know and will never meet. Perhaps we assume that our name, address and search preferences will be viewed by some unseen pair of corporate eyes, probably not human, and don't mind that much.

5. (stressed form) A considerable quantity or number of.

   He had edited the paper for some years.

   He stopped working some time ago.

   • 1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter II, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC, page 15:

     We drove back to the office with some concern on my part at the prospect of so large a case. Sunning himself on the board steps, I saw for the first time Mr. Farquhar Fenelon Cooke. He was dressed out in broad gaiters and bright tweeds, like an English tourist, and his face might have belonged to Dagon, idol of the Philistines.

6. (stressed form) Approximately, about (with a number).

   She has worked at the company for some thirty years now. (31 and two months, to be exact.)

   There were only some three or four cars in the lot at the time.

   • 2003, Richard N. Cooper, Richard Layard, What the Future Holds: Insights from Social Science, MIT Press, →ISBN, page 129:

     What other natural experiments might we have to test climate sensitivity? Another one that happens every year is the change in seasons. Winter predictably follows summer, being some fifteen degrees colder in the Northern Hemisphere and five degrees colder than summer in the Southern Hemisphere. The reason the Southern Hemisphere has a smaller seasonal cycle is because it has much more ocean than land, […]

   • 2023, J. Allen Hynek, The UFO Experience: Evidence Behind Close Encounters, Project Blue Book, and the Search for Answers, Red Wheel/Weiser, →ISBN, page 142:

     the local police, who, with the investigator, reportedly placed a compass near the two signs that had rattled and found a deviation of some fifteen degrees. Placed next to the Renault in which they had come, the compass showed a deviation of only four degrees, but there was no deviation at all near the sign that had not rattled.

7. (stressed form) Emphasizing a number.

   She has worked at the company for some five years now! How remarkable!

9. (informal, stressed form) A remarkable.

   He is some acrobat!

   That was some speech you gave!

Adverb

some (not comparable)

1. Of a measurement: approximately, roughly.

   Synonyms: see Thesaurus:approximately

   I guess he must have weighed some 90 kilos.

   Some 30,000 spectators witnessed the feat.

   Some 4,000 acres of land were flooded.

2. (dialect) To a certain extent, or for a certain period.
   • 2014, C. R. Scott, Invisible War: Attack the Covenant:

     They walked some and talked some.

See also

• Thesaurus:quantifier

Further reading

• “some”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
• “some”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.
• “some”, in Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster, 1996–present.
• “some”, in Dictionary.com Unabridged, Dictionary.com, LLC, 1995–present.

Anagrams

• Meos, 'omes, OMEs, OEMs, meso-, Eoms, emos

Etymology

Contraction of sosiaalinen media (“social media”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈsome/, [ˈs̠o̞me̞]
• Rhymes: -ome
• Hyphenation^(key): so‧me

Noun

some (informal or in compounds)

1. social media

   Jos tänä päivänä aikoo menestyä politiikassa, on pakko olla somessa.

   If one wants to be successful in politics nowadays, it's obligatory to be on social media.

Further reading

• “some”, in Kielitoimiston sanakirja [Dictionary of Contemporary Finnish]‎ (in Finnish) (online dictionary, continuously updated), Kotimaisten kielten keskuksen verkkojulkaisuja 35, Helsinki: Kotimaisten kielten tutkimuskeskus (Institute for the Languages of Finland), 2004–, retrieved 2023-07-03

Anagrams

• meso

Verb

some

1. third-person singular present indicative of sumir
2. (reintegrationist norm) inflection of sumir:
   1. third-person singular present indicative
   2. second-person singular imperative

Noun

some f

1. plural of soma

Anagrams

• Mosè, meso, meso-

Romanization

some

1. Rōmaji transcription of そめ

Pronunciation

• Hyphenation: so‧me

Etymology 1

See the etymology of the corresponding lemma form.

Etymology 2

See the etymology of the corresponding lemma form.

Noun

some (Cyrillic spelling соме)

1. vocative singular of som