gist

noun \ ˈjist \

|Updated on: 30 Jul 2018

Examples: gist in a Sentence

Editor's Note: Did You Know?

Definition of gist

1 : the ground (see ¹ground 2a) of a legal action

2 : the main point or part : essence

the gist of an argument

See gist defined for English-language learners

See gist defined for kids

gist was our Word of the Day on 05/06/2014. Hear the podcast!

Examples of gist in a Sentence

Thus, Poulterers' Case gave rise to a doctrine which survives to this day: the gist of conspiracy is the agreement, and so the agreement is punishable even if its purpose was not achieved. —Wayne R. LaFave & Austin W. Scott, Jr., Criminal Law, (1972) 1986
… Einstein showed how time intervals depend on the motion of people and clocks doing the measuring. And that's the gist of relativity. —Alan Lightman, Science, January/February 1984
Dorothea told him that she had seen Lydgate, and recited the gist of her conversation with him about the Hospital. —George Eliot, Middlemarch, 1872
didn't catch every word between them, but heard enough to get the gist of the conversation

Recent Examples of gist from the Web

Image Basic income is a term that gets thrown around loosely, but the gist is that the government distributes cash universally.

— peter s. goodman, New York Times, "Free Cash to Fight Income Inequality? California City Is First in U.S. to Try," 30 May 2018
Back Caption Options Close Settings Language English Font Size Small Medium Large Position Auto Bottom Top Sample Caption Text 0:00 0:00 0:00 The trailer is all guns and dark jungles and shadows, but the gist is these Predators are different.

— jaya saxena, GQ, "The Predator Trailer Is Dope, But It Will Also Make You Feel Old as Hell," 10 May 2018
Eventually, the gist is able to create something passable.

— david grossman, Popular Mechanics, "AI Algorithms Are Generating Videos Out of Thin Air," 26 Feb. 2018
Bringing Wisconsin to the south has helped The gist of these academies is pretty simple.

— jr radcliffe, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, "Milwaukee-area baseball academies help foster Wisconsin's baseball boom," 13 June 2018
The gist of the stories is that Davidson and Grande, both 24, got engaged in the last week or so after just a few weeks of dating and some very public declarations about each other on social media.

— nardine saad, latimes.com, "Ariana Grande, Pete Davidson reportedly engaged just weeks into whirlwind romance," 11 June 2018
The gist of their plan was to show evidence that Qatar was too close to Iran and supported Islamist groups, including the Muslim Brotherhood.

— NBC News, "AP investigation: A Trump fundraiser's secret lobbying effort to win $1B in business," 21 May 2018
The basic gist of it is this: Lets assume The Big Bang created the universe, and continues to expand infinitely (called eternal inflation).

— aj willingham, CNN, "Stephen Hawking's final research paper has been published, and it's mind-bending," 2 May 2018
However, the gist of it is that private citizens are sometimes barred from suing the government or those who work for the government unless the government agrees to be sued.

— michael mccann, SI.com, "Inside Sterling Brown’s compelling lawsuit against the Milwaukee Police Department and City of Milwaukee," 19 June 2018

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'gist.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

Did You Know?

The gist of the conversation was that .... The word gist often appears in such contexts to let us know that what follows will be a statement or summary that in some way encapsulates the main point or overarching theme. The gist of a conversation, argument, story, or what-have-you is what we rely on when the actual words and details are only imperfectly recalled, inessential, or too voluminous to recount in their entirety. Gist was borrowed from the Anglo-French legal phrase "[cest] action gist" ("[this] action lies") in the early 18th century, and was originally used in legal contexts as a term referring to the foundation or grounds for a legal action without which that action would not be legally sustainable.

Origin and Etymology of gist

Anglo-French, it lies, from gisir to lie, ultimately from Latin jacēre — more at adjacent

NEW! Time Traveler

First Known Use: circa 1711

in the meaning defined at sense 1

See Words from the same year

gist Synonyms

Synonyms

bottom line, bull's-eye, centerpiece, core, crux, essence, heart, kernel, keynote, meat, meat and potatoes, net, nub, nubbin, nucleus, pith, pivot, point, root, sum;

Related Words

course, direction, drift, tenor;

body, content, substance;

hypothesis, proposition, purport, subject, theme, thesis;

Phrases

sum and substance, the long and short (or the long and the short);

GIST Defined for Kids

gist

noun \ ˈjist \

Definition of gist for Students

: the main point of a matter

He spoke so fast, I only got the gist of the story.

Law Dictionary

gist

noun \ ˈjist \

legal Definition of gist

: the ground or foundation of a legal action without which it would not be sustainable

Origin and Etymology of gist

Anglo-French, in the phrase laccion gist the action lies or is based (on), from gisir to lie (of process), from Old French gesir to lie, ultimately from Latin jacere