in the first place

Idioms & Phrases

in the first place

From the beginning, at the outset, before anything else. For example, Why didn't you tell me in the first place that you've decided to leave? or He could have bought a new one in the first place.
As the first of several items in order of importance. This phrase is usually accompanied by in the second place, third place, and so on, as in I'm not joining the health club because, in the first place, I don't like their hours, and in the second place, I can't afford the dues. [First half of 1600s] Also see for one.

The American Heritage® Dictionary of Idioms by Christine Ammer.
Copyright © 1997. Published by Houghton Mifflin.
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WordNet

in the first place
adverb
1.	before now; "why didn't you tell me in the first place?"
2.	of primary import; "this is primarily a question of economics"; "it was in the first place a local matter" [syn: primarily] [ant: secondarily]

WordNet® 3.0, © 2006 by Princeton University.
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00:10

In the first place is always a great word to know.

So is ort. Does it mean:

a printed punctuation mark (‽), available only in some typefaces, designed to combine the question mark (?) and the exclamation point (!), indicating a mixture of query and interjection, as after a rhetorical question.

a scrap or morsel of food left at a meal.

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Matching Quote

"These pages reproduce me very imperfectly, and there are many things in me of which I find no trace in them. I suppose it is because, in the first place, sadness takes up the pen more readily than joy; and, in the next, because I depend so much upon surrounding circumstances. When there is no call upon me, and nothing to put me to the test, I fall back into melancholy; and so the practical man, the cheerful man, the literary man, does not appear in these pages. The portrait is lacking in proportion and breadth; it is one-sided, and wants a center; it has, as it were, been painted from too near."

-Henri-Frédéric Amiel

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Idioms & Phrases

for one