bisect

To cut or divide into two parts.

Noun

  1. A bisector, which divides into two equal parts.
  2. An envelope, card, or fragment thereof showing an affixed cut half of a regular issued stamp, over which one or more postal markings have been applied. Typically used in wartime when normal lower rate stamps may not be available.

Origin

From bi- (“bi-, two”) + Latin secāre (“to cut”).

Forms

bisects

Related

dissect vivisect

Verb

  1. To cut or divide into two parts.
    • The river bisects the town.
    • The quadrennial period of games and festivals in Greece was probably arrived at by bisecting an older octennial period. - 1911, James George Frazer, The Golden Bough, volume 7, page 84:

    1. (transitive, geometry) To divide an angle, line segment, or other figure into two equal parts.

    2. (computing) To perform a binary search on files in source control in order to identify the specific change that introduced a bug etc.

Forms

bisects bisecting bisected

Synonyms

dichotomize dimidiate bipartition bisect half halve

Antonyms

double

Hypernyms

divide