hoar

English

Wikipedia

Etymology

From Middle English hore, from Old English hār (“hoar, hoary, grey, old”), from Proto-Germanic *hairaz (“grey”), from Proto-Indo-European *ḱēy(w)-, *ḱyē(w)- (“grey”). Cognate with German hehr (“noble, sublime”), Latin caerulus, caeruleus (“deep blue, cerulean”).

Pronunciation

• Rhymes: -ɔː(r)

Noun

hoar (plural hoars)

1. A white or greyish-white colour.

   hoar colour:

2. hoariness; antiquity
   • Burke

     Covered with the awful hoar of innumerable ages.

Translations

Colour

Adjective

hoar (not comparable)

1. Of a white or greyish-white colour.
2. (poetic) Hoarily bearded.
   • 1847 Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Evangeline, A Tale of Acadie

     This is the forest primeval. The murmuring pines and the hemlocks,

     Bearded with moss, and in garments green, indistinct in the twilight,

     Stand like Druids of eld, with voices sad and prophetic,

     Stand like harpers hoar, with beards that rest on their bosoms.

Derived terms

• hoarfrost
• hoary
• hoared

Related terms

• haar
• horehound

See also

• Appendix:Colors

Verb

hoar (third-person singular simple present hoars, present participle hoaring, simple past and past participle hoared)

1. (obsolete, intransitive) To become mouldy or musty.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Shakespeare to this entry?)

Anagrams

• haor
• hora

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Swedish

Noun

hoar

1. indefinite plural of ho

Verb

hoar

1. present tense of hoa.