Definition of "brief" []

• Short in time, duration, length, or extent. (adjective)
• Succinct; concise: a brief account of the incident. (adjective)
• Curt; abrupt. (adjective)
• A short, succinct statement. (noun)
• A condensation or an abstract of a larger document or series of documents. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "The brief you will be making now will consist of an _introduction_, which states whatever facts and principles are necessary to an understanding of the brief, and the _brief_ itself, which consists of a series of propositions, each supporting your main contention, and each in turn supported by others, which again may each be supported by another series."
• "Secretary Gates used the term brief pause again in his testimony."
• "At any rate, without going into that specifically, in February he used the term brief pause."