thirdhand

adjective

third·​hand ˈthərd-ˈhand How to pronounce thirdhand (audio)
1
: received from or through two intermediaries
thirdhand information
2
a
: acquired after being used by two previous owners
b
: dealing in thirdhand merchandise

Examples of thirdhand in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web This message is conveyed to me thirdhand, via the guy who ran the small Detroit label that put out the first White Stripes seven-inches back in 1998, who has spoken with the band’s extremely introverted drummer’s close friend, who apparently has delivered my request to the woman herself. Melissa Giannini, ELLE, 1 June 2023 The Information’s report also contains the potentially staggering thirdhand allegation that Google stooped so low as to train Bard using data from OpenAI’s ChatGPT, scraped from a website called ShareGPT. Sean Hollister, The Verge, 30 Mar. 2023 More:What is thirdhand smoke? The Enquirer, 8 Sep. 2022 He’s heard they were killed by the government, though word of their deaths — like much of the news from Cuba — was unofficial and thirdhand from Collazo’s grandmother, who is friends with the grandmother of one of the men. Washington Post, 9 Aug. 2021 In the teleconference, Gentner and Sheu didn’t have any direct advice as to lowering the spread of thirdhand smoke. Hailey Rose McLaughlin, Discover Magazine, 4 Mar. 2020 Secondhand and thirdhand smoke from both regular and e-cigarettes, may expose children to metals such as cadmium and lead. Dr. Aaron Bernstein, Chicago Tribune, 26 Sep. 2022 In asserting that the death was murder, Dostoevsky’s daughter Lyubov had relied on thirdhand information. Gary Saul Morson, The New York Review of Books, 15 June 2021

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'thirdhand.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Word History

First Known Use

1598, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Time Traveler
The first known use of thirdhand was in 1598

Dictionary Entries Near thirdhand

Cite this Entry

“Thirdhand.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/thirdhand. Accessed 24 Apr. 2024.

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