Definitions

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

  • adjective Halfway or partially broken; somewhat broken.

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle English *half-broken, from Old English healfbrocen ("half-broken"), equivalent to half- +‎ broken. Compare Dutch half gebroken ("half-broken").

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Examples

  • All of the furniture—the dressers in the bedrooms, the wooden stand in the hallway for mail and the telephone, the kitchen table—looked dumpy and half-broken.

    Dirty Secret Jessie Sholl 2011

  • The one, half-amphibian, breasting the water with muscular arms, could not hope to overtake or escape an enemy who propelled a fire-hollowed tree trunk by means of a wooden paddle; nor could the other, trusting to his own nimbleness, compete with a foe who careered wildly across the plain on the back of a half-broken stallion.

    The Shrinkage of the Planet 2010

  • He has four TVs—including a 46-inch Internet TV and a 37-inch screen in what he called a "mini man cave"—but still prefers a transistor radio and his pair of half-broken headphones.

    Catching the Knicks, 1960s-Style Ben Cohen 2012

  • The last of them, astride a Palomina three-year-old that was as graceful and wild as a half-broken Arab, was for riding by with a bare salute, but was stopped by his employer.

    CHAPTER II 2010

  • Mary picked up a half-broken chair, wedged one leg in a crack in the small fireplace, and began to break the wood into smaller pieces.

    One Night in Scotland Karen Hawkins 2010

  • He did not ride particularly well, and in the scene as planned he would be mounting a half-broken mare only a few feet from a precipice that would have produced a very considerable fall.

    HOLLYWOOD Larry McMurtry 2010

  • Four minutes later, the master called for the end of the game, and the boys gracefully pulled up their horses and waited again, panting, their gazes fixed upon the half-broken target, which was littered with arrows.

    Shadow Princess Indu Sundaresan 2010

  • Julian unlocked the half-broken door of the study he was in, and peered cautiously into the hall.

    An Open Letter to Fans of South Plains Football 2010

  • Four minutes later, the master called for the end of the game, and the boys gracefully pulled up their horses and waited again, panting, their gazes fixed upon the half-broken target, which was littered with arrows.

    Shadow Princess Indu Sundaresan 2010

  • Four minutes later, the master called for the end of the game, and the boys gracefully pulled up their horses and waited again, panting, their gazes fixed upon the half-broken target, which was littered with arrows.

    Shadow Princess Indu Sundaresan 2010

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