# Time expression: "Quarter of" **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [October 23, 2010, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-expression-quarter-of/558105 "2010-10-23T16:24:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Darth\_Panda](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ee7513/32.png) [@Darth\_Panda](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darth_Panda)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2010, 3:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-expression-quarter-of/558105/41 "2010-10-24T03:57:42Z")
> [@Chessic\_Sense](#): > > If you really want to talk time oddities, let’s go with this one. Quick, it’s 11:45 pm, night time, right now. How long until 12:15 pm? Half hour, right? Wrong. 12:15 happened 11.5 hours ago, at lunch time. For some reason, someone thought it was wise to make 12 come before 1. What’s up with that? Well, you could make like power traders/schedulers and refer to times as hour ending 1, hour ending 2, etc. It’s not complicated, but it’s a little confusing at first. Hour ending 1 refers to the first hour of the day, i.e. midnight thru 1 am. So, hour ending ending 14 starts at 1 pm. ---
**Author:** ![Richard\_Pearse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/richard_pearse/32/13144_2.png) [@Richard\_Pearse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Pearse)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2010, 4:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-expression-quarter-of/558105/42 "2010-10-24T04:23:02Z")
> [@Chessic\_Sense](#): > > If you really want to talk time oddities, let’s go with this one. Quick, it’s 11:45 pm, night time, right now. How long until 12:15 pm? Half hour, right? Wrong. 12:15 happened 11.5 hours ago, at lunch time. For some reason, someone thought it was wise to make 12 come before 1. What’s up with that? Using the 24 hour clock fixes this neatly. ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2010, 4:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-expression-quarter-of/558105/43 "2010-10-24T04:28:00Z")
> [@notfrommensa](#): > > I grew up in the East, mainly Northeast, and “quarter of eight” was mostly used when it was 7:45. > > I remember my grandmother also saying “half-past seven” instead of “seven thirty.” To this day, she is the only person I have ever heard say “half-past …”. > > She immigrated to the US as a very young girl from Ireland, around 1900. Really? “Half past” is very common here (Chicago), and I use it myself interchangebly with the regular “-thirty” construction. It’s also memorialized in the classic (at least when I was growing up–I’m 35) schoolboy reply to “what time is it?” : “Half past monkey’s ass, quarter to his balls.” ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2010, 6:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-expression-quarter-of/558105/44 "2010-10-24T06:09:46Z")
These things are both regional and changeable. A usage that, though not new, seems to have become more acceptable in Britain recently is saying, e.g., “half nine” instead of “half past nine.” These days I hear it quite a lot when I listen to BBC radio over the internet. When I lived in Britain, 20 years ago, people might sometimes have said this in informal speech, but I pretty sure any BBC announcer who said it would have been in big trouble. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2010, 6:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-expression-quarter-of/558105/45 "2010-10-24T06:30:00Z")
> [@pulykamell](#): > > Really? “Half past” is very common here (Chicago), and I use it myself interchangebly with the regular “-thirty” construction. It’s also memorialized in the classic (at least when I was growing up–I’m 35) schoolboy reply to “what time is it?” : “Half past monkey’s ass, quarter to his balls.” That was all familiar to me in West Texas, too. ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2010, 6:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-expression-quarter-of/558105/46 "2010-10-24T06:32:34Z")
> [@notfrommensa](#): > > I grew up in the East, mainly Northeast, and “quarter of eight” was mostly used when it was 7:45. > > I remember my grandmother also saying “half-past seven” instead of “seven thirty.” To this day, she is the only person I have ever heard say “half-past …”. > > She immigrated to the US as a very young girl from Ireland, around 1900. I was taught in second or third grade (mid-80s, living in MA) to label time as hour -\> quarter past-\> half past -\> quarter of. We did worksheets on the concepts and everything. It’s so ingrained that I’m baffled that anyone might assume that quarter of might mean 15 minutes after the hour rather than before. ---
**Author:** ![Richard\_Pearse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/richard_pearse/32/13144_2.png) [@Richard\_Pearse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Pearse)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2010, 7:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-expression-quarter-of/558105/47 "2010-10-24T07:24:17Z")
> [@elfkin477](#): > > I was taught in second or third grade (mid-80s, living in MA) to label time as hour -\> quarter past-\> half past -\> quarter of. We did worksheets on the concepts and everything. It’s so ingrained that I’m baffled that anyone might assume that quarter of might mean 15 minutes after the hour rather than before. Well the problem is that as a sentence it makes no sense. Unless you are specifically familiar with the phrase then there is nothing about “quarter of” that gives a clue to what it means. ---
**Author:** ![Outpits](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/4bbf92/32.png) [@Outpits](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Outpits)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2010, 10:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-expression-quarter-of/558105/48 "2010-10-24T10:57:17Z")
> [@notfrommensa](#): > > I grew up in the East, mainly Northeast, and “quarter of eight” was mostly used when it was 7:45. > > I remember my grandmother also saying “half-past seven” instead of “seven thirty.” To this day, she is the only person I have ever heard say “half-past …”. > > She immigrated to the US as a very young girl from Ireland, around 1900. It the south (at least Arkansas) when I was growing up in the 70’s is was common to hear and say “half past seven”. The one that threw me was the people who would say “half seven” to mean 7:30. I have since heard this much more from Irish and Brits. ---
**Author:** ![Shinna\_Minna\_Ma](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f08c70/32.png) [@Shinna\_Minna\_Ma](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shinna_Minna_Ma)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2010, 11:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-expression-quarter-of/558105/49 "2010-10-24T11:11:12Z")
I grew up in Baltimore, and I’ve been saying “quarter of,” “twenty of,” “ten of,” and so on all my life. Around where I grew up, I don’t remember anyone saying “to” instead of “of.” ---
**Author:** ![LouisB](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/dfb087/32.png) [@LouisB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LouisB)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2010, 11:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-expression-quarter-of/558105/50 "2010-10-24T11:35:06Z")
Back home in Texas, before dirt was invented, I remember hearing ‘quarter of five’ expressed as ‘quarter till five.’ I also remember ‘quarter after five,’ ‘half past five,’ etc., etc. Of course, we didn’t have digital clocks to complicate things; we had to remember the big hand, little hand thing. Digital is better. ---
**Author:** ![ed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/c77e96/32.png) [@ed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ed)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2010, 5:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-expression-quarter-of/558105/51 "2010-10-24T17:49:33Z")
[First song that popped into my mind…](http://www.google.com/url?url=http://ilike.myspacecdn.com/play%23They%2BMight%2BBe%2BGiants:Four%2Bof%2BTwo:61025:s42794710.11221936.2588540.0.2.60%252Cstd_af653c69b73f4f5991b1346474bed0cf&rct=j&sa=X&ei=hnDETM-iJ4aKlwectcSjCg&sqi=2&ved=0CBQQ0wQoADAA&q=they+might+be+giants+four+of+two&usg=AFQjCNFVcXPRqkfneVkIgTdur8XUC9kyig&cad=rjt) Interestingly around here, the actual hour is sometimes dropped when the discussion is about some immediate timeframe that everyone knows. For example, when waiting for a scheduled event, like a bus arriving or the end/start of a game or practice. “What time is it?” “Quarter of.” Kind of funny, but I hear it all the time. ---
**Author:** ![JoelUpchurch](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f05b48/32.png) [@JoelUpchurch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JoelUpchurch)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2010, 6:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-expression-quarter-of/558105/52 "2010-10-24T18:26:01Z")
I grew up in Tennessee and I recall hearing quarter of and half all my life. I have a friend, who has a clock that tolls the quarter hours. I think that terminology would be handy if you had a clock like that. I may be imagining things, but I seem to recall hearing an announcer on NPR using that terminology or at least saying that it was half past the hour. I also recall hearing “at the top of the hour”, which doesn’t make much sense, except on an analog clock. For that matter, I wonder if kids get confused if they are told to turn clockwise? ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2010, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-expression-quarter-of/558105/53 "2010-10-24T18:47:44Z")
> [@Outpits](#): > > It the south (at least Arkansas) when I was growing up in the 70’s is was common to hear and say “half past seven”. The one that threw me was the people who would say “half seven” to mean 7:30. I have since heard this much more from Irish and Brits. And this always confuses me, because I can’t remember whether half seven is 7:30 or 6:30. To explain: in other languages I know smatterings of, like German and Hungarian, the expression _halb sieben_ or _fêl hét_ (literally, “half seven”) would mean 6:30. I forget what it’s like in German, but in Hungarian _negyed hét_ (“one fourth seven”) means 6:15 and, similarly _háromnegyed hét_ (“three-quarters seven”) means 6:45. Think of it as a quarter of the way to seven, half-way to seven, and three-quarters of the way to seven. ---
**Author:** ![groman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/73ab20/32.png) [@groman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/groman)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2010, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-expression-quarter-of/558105/54 "2010-10-24T18:52:44Z")
I am still not getting how this could’ve possibly originated. “Till”, “to”, “past”, “before”, “after” all make sense in the context of the direction the time goes. These words are all used in very similar contexts elsewhere and mean the same thing. “of” does not (as far as I know) Top and bottom of the hour are a convention for labeling two existing sides of a scale. “of” is completely ambiguous. When you say “quarter of 7”, you mean there’s 7 o’clock, and then there’s… a quarter of it… which literally means 1:45, but that makes no sense. So assume you mean a quarter of an hour, but then I would infer you meant 6:15 (half of 7 being 6:30, and three quarters of 7 being 6:45). However, perhaps you meant a quarter of an hour that is typically called “7”, which would mean you meant 7:15. I just can’t think of any other context where the preposition “of” is used to mean anything like “preceding” or “before”. I am just not following how this could’ve occurred as a regionalism. Some family somewhere must have first started doing it first, but since it would not have been clear from context what they meant how could it have spread? ---
**Author:** ![Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/46a35a/32.png) [@Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tim_T-Bonham.net)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2010, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-expression-quarter-of/558105/55 "2010-10-24T22:03:08Z")
> [@Candyman74](#): > > That’s not something I’ve ever heard, and I’m English It’s in all the Agatha Christie books. ---
**Author:** ![Candyman74](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ad7895/32.png) [@Candyman74](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Candyman74)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2010, 10:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-expression-quarter-of/558105/56 "2010-10-24T22:12:17Z")
> [@Outpits](#): > > It the south (at least Arkansas) when I was growing up in the 70’s is was common to hear and say “half past seven”. The one that threw me was the people who would say “half seven” to mean 7:30. I have since heard this much more from Irish and Brits. It’s a shortened version of the same thing. Just missing a word. That’s exactly how most people I know speak. Half past seven… half seven. A simple abbreviation. ---
**Author:** ![beowulff](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beowulff/32/542_2.png) [@beowulff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/beowulff)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2010, 11:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-expression-quarter-of/558105/57 "2010-10-24T23:30:56Z")
> [@groman](#): > > I am still not getting how this could’ve possibly originated. > > “Till”, “to”, “past”, “before”, “after” all make sense in the context of the direction the time goes. These words are all used in very similar contexts elsewhere and mean the same thing. “of” does not (as far as I know) > > Top and bottom of the hour are a convention for labeling two existing sides of a scale. > > “of” is completely ambiguous. When you say “quarter of 7”, you mean there’s 7 o’clock, and then there’s… a quarter of it… which literally means 1:45, but that makes no sense. > > So assume you mean a quarter of an hour, but then I would infer you meant 6:15 (half of 7 being 6:30, and three quarters of 7 being 6:45). > > However, perhaps you meant a quarter of an hour that is typically called “7”, which would mean you meant 7:15. > > I just can’t think of any other context where the preposition “of” is used to mean anything like “preceding” or “before”. I am just not following how this could’ve occurred as a regionalism. Some family somewhere must have first started doing it first, but since it would not have been clear from context what they meant how could it have spread? The definition of of from Merriam-Webster online: > [@](#): > > 11a —used as a function word to indicate the position in time of an action or occurrence \ > b : before \ ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2010, 12:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-expression-quarter-of/558105/58 "2010-10-25T00:39:07Z")
> [@groman](#): > > I am still not getting how this could’ve possibly originated. > > “Till”, “to”, “past”, “before”, “after” all make sense in the context of the direction the time goes. These words are all used in very similar contexts elsewhere and mean the same thing. “of” does not (as far as I know) Baffles me, too. The first time I heard “Quarter of” I didn’t want to look stupid so I sat there trying to figure out what the hell it could mean. Logically, it seemed to me, “Quarter of eight” should be 7:15… that’s a quarter of the way into the eighth hour. But that seemed unlikely; 7:45 or 8:15 seemed likelier. There was no logical way to tell which it was, though. Southern Ontario here, by the way. ---
**Author:** ![matt\_mcl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ab992/32.png) [@matt\_mcl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt_mcl)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2010, 2:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-expression-quarter-of/558105/59 "2010-10-25T02:38:32Z")
> [@Kiyoshi](#): > > Don’t worry about being old just yet! It’s a question of location, not age. I only know the words “to” and “past”. Yup. Despite being 29, I was also brought up with both analogue and digital clocks, and among people who routinely spoke of “five to nine” or “quarter past eight,” as I do myself. But I never encountered the expression “quarter of nine” or “five of nine” before adulthood. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2010, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-expression-quarter-of/558105/60 "2010-10-25T03:03:49Z")
> [@matt\_mcl](#): > > Yup. Despite being 29, I was also brought up with both analogue and digital clocks… Really, is there anyone who hasn’t seen a standard clock, anyway? I can understand kids who’ve never seen a rotary phone or a TV that works with rabbit ears, but standard clocks are \*all over the place. \* They’re still pretty commonly used. The stores are full of them. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-expression-quarter-of/558105.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-expression-quarter-of/558105.md?page=4)