Definitions

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

  • adjective Exhaustively complete.
  • adjective Painstakingly accurate or careful.
  • adjective Absolute; utter.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun That which goes through.
  • noun A furrow between two ridges.
  • noun Same as perpend.
  • noun In Brit. hist., in the reign of Charles I., the policy of Strafford and Laud of conducting or carrying through (‘thorough’) the administration of public affairs without regard to obstacles. Hence the word is associated with their system of tyranny.
  • Going through; through, in a literal sense: a form now occurring only in dialectal use or in certain phrases and compounds. See through, adjective
  • Going through, as to the end or bottom of anything; thoroughgoing.
  • Leaving nothing undone; slighting nothing; not superficial.
  • Fully executed; having no deficiencies; hence, complete in all respects; unqualified; perfect.
  • Earnest; ardent. [Rare.]
  • Through. See through, a later form of thorough, now the exclusive form as a preposition and adverb.
  • Through: as, thoroughgoing. See through, adverb

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun Prov. Eng. A furrow between two ridges, to drain off the surface water.
  • adverb Obs. or Colloq. Thoroughly.
  • adverb obsolete Through.
  • adjective obsolete Passing through.
  • adjective Passing through or to the end; hence, complete; perfect.
  • preposition obsolete Through.

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

  • adjective painstaking and careful not to miss or omit any detail
  • adjective utter; complete; absolute
  • noun UK, dialect A furrow between two ridges, to drain off the surface water.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adjective painstakingly careful and accurate
  • adjective performed comprehensively and completely

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English thorow, through, thorough, from Old English thuruh, from end to end, through; see terə- in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Old English þuruh.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

A disyllabic form of Old English þurh ("through").

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