See Also: bench(2)(dictionary)
BENCH(law)
bench(1)(dictionary)
bench(medicine)
Bench - Basketball(gambling)
Treasury Bench, the(dictionary)
bench 1, noun(dictionary)
bench 2, verb(dictionary)
front bench(dictionary)
Approach The Bench(law)

bench(1) (iou)



bench noun. See also BINK.

A long seat, usually of wood or stone, with or without a back. OE.
Bible (Coverdale): Esther 1:6 The benches were of golde and siluer. M. Spark The small girls took their lessons seated on three benches arranged about the elm.
b. A seat or thwart in a boat. M16.
A bank or shelf of ground; a level ledge in earthwork, masonry, etc.; an outcropping level stratum; US a river terrace. ME.
The seat on which the judge or judges sit in court; the office or status of a judge. ME.
on the bench serving as a judge or magistrate.
D. Jacobson He was in due course promoted to the bench, on which he served to the end of his days.
b. A place where justice is administered; a court of law. ME.
King's Bench Division of the High Court, Queen's Bench Division of the High Court, (Hist.) King's Bench, Queen's Bench one of the divisions of the High Court (formerly a court at which the monarch presided).
c. The judge or magistrate; the judges or magistrates collectively. L16.
Disraeli Now, prisoner, the bench is ready to hear your confession.
A seat where a number of people sit side by side in some official capacity; esp. one occupied by a group in the British Parliament. ME.
back bench, cross-bench, front bench, Treasury bench, etc.
W. Shenstone A little bench of heedless bishops And there a chancellor in embryo. W. S. Churchill I invite former colleagues on the opposite Bench to share the credit.
b. The people collectively who occupy such a seat; their status or dignity. E17.
Formerly, a merchant's table; a banker's counter. Now, a worktop used by a carpenter etc., or in a laboratory. LME.
optical bench: see OPTICAL adjective.
J. S. Huxley Between days of hard work at my bench I explored the exciting neighbourhood.
Law (now Hist.). free bench [Anglo-Latin bancus francus], a widow's dower out of copyholds to which she was entitled by the customs of some manors. L17.
A ledge or floor upon which retorts stand; a set of retorts. M19.
A collection of dogs as exhibited at a show on benches or platforms. L19.
A seat used by officials and players when not participating in a game; the persons collectively who occupy such a seat. E20.
Comb.: bench-end the end of a seat in a church, freq. ornamented; bench-hole a privy, a lavatory; bench-hook a board with stops fitted at each end on opposite faces, used on a carpenter's bench to secure a workpiece; bench press a body-building and weightlifting exercise in which a lifter lies on a bench with feet on the floor and raises a weight with both arms; bench-press verb trans. & intrans. raise (a weight) in a bench press; bench-screw a vice attached to a carpenter's bench; bench seat a seat across the whole width of a car etc.; bench-stop, bench-strip a pillar or strip which projects above the surface of a carpenter's bench, used to secure a workpiece; bench-table (a) a low stone seat on the inside of walls or round the bases of pillars, in churches, cloisters, etc.; (b) Hist. an official body of benchers at the Inner Temple; bench test a test of a motor engine carried out in a workshop before it is fitted to a motor body; bench-test verb trans. subject to a bench test, test in conditions simulating real use; bench-warmer N. Amer. slang a sports player who does not get selected to play, a substitute; bench-warrant a warrant issued by a judge in court for the arrest of a person who fails to appear, as opp. to a justice's or magistrate's warrant.
benchlet noun a little bench; a stool: M19.