half-staff

1. 1.

   a position some distance below the top of a mast to which a flag is lowered in mourning or to signal distress

   Synonymshalf-mast

   Broaderposition

Questions about half-staff

What does half-staff mean?

half-staff means "a position some distance below the top of a mast to which a flag is lowered in mourning or to signal distress".

How many syllables are in half-staff?

half-staff has 2 syllables and divides as half--staff under the regular spelling rules. It is not in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary, so that comes from how the word is written rather than from a recorded pronunciation, and no stress or phonetic transcription is claimed for it.

What is another word for half-staff?

Close synonyms include half-mast. Each sense on this page lists its own synonyms, because a word with several meanings rarely has one substitute that works for all of them.