Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun An extremely short period of time; an instant.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun An act of blinking one's eyelids one time.
  • noun A moment; a very short period of time.

Etymologies

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Examples

  • On the afternoon of August 20, 1910, a battering ram of wind moved through the drought-stricken national forests of Washington, Idaho, Montana, whipping the hundreds of small blazes burning across the forest floor into a roaring inferno that jumped from treetop to ridge as it raged, destroying towns and timber in an eyeblink.

    The Big Burn by Timothy Egan: Book summary 2010

  • In an eyeblink she was behind me and in another she was still walking toward me, until I felt dizzy as if she was approaching me from both directions at once.

    Crossed J.F. Lewis 2011

  • Even so, by the standards of evolution and geologic history it is an eyeblink.

    SuperCooperators Martin A. Nowak 2011

  • And happy ones, I hope, for kalquessa today, and rhinemouse in the eyeblink between today and tomorrow.

    superversive: More birthdays . . . superversive 2010

  • In an eyeblink she was behind me and in another she was still walking toward me, until I felt dizzy as if she was approaching me from both directions at once.

    Crossed J.F. Lewis 2011

  • So maybe there are enormous subcrustal water reservoirs ... but why would they well to the surface right now in an eyeblink compared with the history of the planet?

    REVIEW: Flood by Stephen Baxter 2009

  • And then between that lost mission and the loss of Columbia in '03 came that other event when, in an eyeblink, two mighty steel towers gave way to blank sky too.

    Terry Marotta: My Road Not Taken -- in Space Terry Marotta 2011

  • And then between that lost mission and the loss of Columbia in '03 came that other event when, in an eyeblink, two mighty steel towers gave way to blank sky too.

    Terry Marotta: My Road Not Taken -- in Space Terry Marotta 2011

  • But Christianity, in Mr. Sebag Montefiore's tale, is little more than a sideshow in the Jerusalem story, an eyeblink in a foreground struggle between Arabs and Jews.

    City of Peace—and War Norman Lebrecht 2011

  • And happy ones, I hope, for kalquessa today, and rhinemouse in the eyeblink between today and tomorrow.

    More birthdays . . . superversive 2010

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