[f. WINE sb.1 + GLASS sb.1 Cf. (M)LG., MHG. wînglas, (Du. wijnglas, G. weinglas), etc.] A small drinking-glass for wine. Also = wineglassful.
Wine-glasses, which are characterized by having a stem and a foot, vary in shape (and, in some cases, in color) according to the wine for which they are intended, and are distinguished as champagne glass, claret glass, port glass, etc.
1709. Lond. Gaz., No. 4595/4. Wine and Water Tumblers, Beer and Wine Glasses with Covers.
1856. Kane, Arctic Expl., II. ii. 37. I am dealing these out to them by the wine-glass.
1882. Floyer, Unexpl. Balūchistan, 331. We began with minute wine-glasses of raki, red wine, purple wine.
b. attrib. Resembling a wine-glass in shape. c. Comb., as wineglass-cooler, -shaped adj.
1851. Redding, Wines (ed. 3), 370. Wine-glass coolers, with the coldest water, should be laid on the table and the glasses reversed in them.
1884. Howells, Silas Lapham, i. A smooth piece of interval, with half a dozen good sized wine-glass elms in it.
1907. M. C. F. Morris, Nunburnholme, 78. The other and smaller bell, which was long and wineglass-shaped, bore no inscription or ornament of any kind.
1908. Essex Rev., XVII. 6. There was an old-fashioned wine-glass pulpit with reading-desk below.
Hence Wineglassful, the contents of a full wine-glass; the amount that a wine-glass will hold, usually reckoned as 2 fluid ounces.
1807. Charleston Courier, 10 Jan., 2/3. I then give a wine-glassful of the following mixture every three hours.
1824. Scott, St. Ronan’s, vii. My venerated instructor … took a wine-glassful of old rum … every day after his dinner.
1884. M. Mackenzie, Dis. Throat & Nose, II. 352. A wineglassful of spirits of turpentine.
