{
    "term": "thumb",
    "partOfSpeech": "noun",
    "ox5000": true,
    "cefr": "b2",
    "image": "data/images/bo/body_hand.png",
    "definitions": [
        {
            "senseNumber": 1,
            "definition": "the short, thick finger at the side of the hand, slightly apart from the other four",
            "cefr": "b2",
            "examples": [
                {
                    "text": "She still **sucks her thumb** when she's worried."
                },
                {
                    "text": "He smiled and raised a thumb in greeting."
                },
                {
                    "text": "I picked up the beetle carefully between finger and thumb."
                },
                {
                    "text": "I stuck out a thumb and a car stopped immediately."
                }
            ],
            "topics": ["Body"],
            "collocations": {
                "verb + thumb": ["suck", "flick", "jab"],
                "thumb + noun": ["nail"],
                "phrases": [
                    "between finger and thumb",
                    "between thumb and forefinger",
                    "thumbs up"
                ]
            }
        },
        {
            "senseNumber": 2,
            "definition": "the part of a glove that covers the thumb",
            "cefr": "b2",
            "examples": [
                {
                    "text": "There's a hole in the thumb."
                }
            ]
        },
        {
            "senseNumber": null,
            "definition": "to be awkward with your hands so that you drop things or are unable to do something",
            "examples": []
        },
        {
            "senseNumber": null,
            "definition": "to hope that your plans will be successful or that something will take place in the way that you want it to",
            "labels": "(South African English)",
            "examples": [
                {
                    "text": "Let's hold thumbs that you get the job."
                }
            ],
            "topics": ["Success"]
        },
        {
            "senseNumber": null,
            "definition": "a practical method of doing or measuring something, usually based on past experience rather than on exact measurement",
            "examples": [
                {
                    "text": "As a rule of thumb, you should cook a chicken for 20 minutes for each pound of weight."
                }
            ]
        },
        {
            "senseNumber": null,
            "definition": "to be very easy to notice in an unpleasant way",
            "examples": [
                {
                    "text": "The blue building stood out like a sore thumb among the whitewashed villas."
                },
                {
                    "text": "If you wear a suit to the party, you’ll stand out like a sore thumb."
                }
            ]
        },
        {
            "senseNumber": null,
            "definition": "used to show that something has been accepted/rejected or that it is/is not a success",
            "labels": "(informal)",
            "examples": [
                {
                    "text": "Their proposals **were given the thumbs down**."
                },
                {
                    "text": "It looks like it's thumbs up for their latest album."
                },
                {
                    "text": "He made a thumbs-up sign through the window to tell us everything was fine."
                }
            ],
            "topics": ["Success", "Difficulty and failure"]
        },
        {
            "senseNumber": 1,
            "definition": "to move your thumbs around each other with your fingers joined together",
            "examples": []
        },
        {
            "senseNumber": 2,
            "definition": "to do nothing while you are waiting for something to happen",
            "examples": [
                {
                    "text": "We can't just sit here twiddling our thumbs and hoping everything will be all right."
                }
            ]
        },
        {
            "senseNumber": null,
            "definition": "completely controlled by somebody",
            "labels": "(informal)",
            "examples": [
                {
                    "text": "She’s got him under her thumb."
                }
            ]
        }
    ],
    "pronunciations": {
        "uk": [
            {
                "pronunciation": "/θʌm/",
                "audio": "th/thumb/thumb__gb_2.mp3"
            }
        ],
        "us": [
            {
                "pronunciation": "/θʌm/",
                "audio": "th/thumb/thumb__us_1.mp3"
            }
        ]
    },
    "wordOrigin": "Old English thūma, of West Germanic origin; related to Dutch duim and German Daumen, from an Indo-European root shared by Latin tumere ‘to swell’. The verb dates from the late 16th cent., first in the sense ‘play (a musical instrument) with the thumbs’."
}