purple
See also: Purple
EnglishEdit
EtymologyEdit
From Middle English purple, purpel, purpur, from Old English purple, purpuren (“purple”), taken from Latin purpura (“purple dye, shellfish”), from Ancient Greek πορφύρα (porphúra, “purple fish”), perhaps of Semitic origin. Doublet of purpura.
PronunciationEdit
- (UK) IPA(key): /ˈpɜː(ɹ).pəl/
- (General American) IPA(key): /ˈpɝ.pəl/
Audio (US) (file) - Rhymes: -ɜː(ɹ)pəl
NounEdit
purple (plural purples)
- A color that is a dark blend of red and blue; dark magenta.
- purple:
- bright purple:
- Synonym: blue-red
- 1667, John Milton, “Book IV”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC, lines 596–597:
- Arraying with reflected Purple and Gold / The Clouds that on his Weſtern Throne attend.
- (colour theory) Any non-spectral colour on the line of purples on a colour chromaticity diagram or a colour wheel between violet and red.
- Cloth, or a garment, dyed a purple colour; especially, a purple robe, worn as an emblem of rank or authority; specifically, the purple robe or mantle worn by Ancient Roman emperors as the emblem of imperial dignity.
- to put on the imperial purple
- 1610, The Second Tome of the Holie Bible, […] (Douay–Rheims Bible), Doway: Lavrence Kellam, […], →OCLC, Canticle of Canticles 7:5, page 341:
- Thy head as Carmelus: and the heares of thy head as a kings purple tyed to cundite pipes.
- (by extension) Imperial power, because the colour purple was worn by emperors and kings.
- 1776-1788, Edward Gibbon, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
- He was born in the purple.
- 1946, Bertrand Russell, History of Western Philosophy, I.29:
- The immediate successors of Augustus indulged in appalling cruelties towards senators and towards possible competitors for the purple.
- 1776-1788, Edward Gibbon, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
- Any of various species of mollusks from which Tyrian purple dye was obtained, especially the common dog whelk.
- The purple haze cultivar of cannabis in the kush family, either pure or mixed with others, or by extension any variety of smoked marijuana.
- 2005, Tipi Paul, Wanna Smoke?: The Adventures of a Storyteller, page 14:
- "Sure, some purple Owlsley."
- 2010, Mark Arax, West of the West, page 221:
- “Purple smoke is no joke. Especially when it is real purple. The smell, taste, and high is easily one of the best in the world. One bowl of some purple Kush, and I'm done for a couple of hours.
- 2011, Danielle Santiago, Allure of the Game, page 148:
- She preferred to smoke some good purple, but getting high wasn't an option.
- (medicine) Purpura.
- Earcockle, a disease of wheat.
- Any of the species of large butterflies, usually marked with purple or blue, of the genus Basilarchia (formerly Limenitis).
- the banded purple
- A cardinalate.
- (slang, US) Ellipsis of purple drank.
- 2012, “Magic”, in Pluto, performed by Future ft. T.I.:
- Fishtailing out the parking lot leaving Magic / Sipping on the purple and the yellow, drinking magic
- (UK, slang) Synonym of snakebite and black.
TranslationsEdit
colour
|
a purple robe, worn as an emblem of rank or authority
mollusk
AdjectiveEdit
purple (comparative purpler or more purple, superlative purplest or most purple)
- Having a colour/color that is a dark blend of red and blue.
- Synonym: (literary, poetic) purpureal
- 1908, W[illiam] B[lair] M[orton] Ferguson, chapter IV, in Zollenstein, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, →OCLC, page 40:
- So this was my future home, I thought! […] Backed by towering hills, the but faintly discernible purple line of the French boundary off to the southwest, a sky of palest Gobelin flecked with fat, fleecy little clouds, it in truth looked a dear little city; the city of one's dreams.
- (US politics) Not predominantly red or blue, but having a mixture of Democrat and Republican support.
- purple city
- 2010, Hal K. Rothman, The Making of Modern Nevada, University of Nevada Press, →ISBN, page 162:
- In the end, Nevada remained the quintessential purple state. On the maps that television used to illustrate political trends, Republican states were red and Democratic blue. Nevada blended the colors. It had a bright blue core in the heart of Las Vegas, surrounded by a purple suburban belt. Most of the rest of the state was bright red, especially in the rural counties.
- 2023 May 4, Frank Bruni, “Republicans Are Running Wild in My State”, in The New York Times[2]:
- Political colorists can be promiscuous in calling states purple, but my state is true to that hue. I speak of North Carolina, and I have receipts: While our junior senator, Ted Budd, is a Republican who won election to a first term in 2022 by about three percentage points, our governor, Roy Cooper, is a Democrat who won election to a second term in 2020 by more than four.
- (in Netherlands and Belgium) Mixed between social democrats and liberals.
- Imperial; regal.
- 1818 October, Percy Bysshe Shelley, “Lines Written among the Euganean Hills, October, 1818”, in Rosalind and Helen, a Modern Eclogue; with Other Poems, London: […] [C. H. Reynell] for C[harles] and J[ames] Ollier, […], published 1819, →OCLC, page 82:
- Grovel on the earth: aye, hide / In the dust thy purple pride!
- Blood-red; bloody.
- c. 1591–1592 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Third Part of Henry the Sixt, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene vi], page 171, column 2:
- O may ſuch purple teares be alway ſhed
- 1697, Virgil, “The Sixth Book of the Æneis”, in John Dryden, transl., The Works of Virgil: Containing His Pastorals, Georgics, and Æneis. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC, lines 133–134, page 366:
- Wars, horrid Wars I view; a field of Blood; / And Tyber rolling with a Purple Flood.
- (of language) Extravagantly ornate, like purple prose.
- (motor racing, of a sector, lap, etc.) Completed in the fastest time so far in a given session.
AntonymsEdit
- (having purple as its colour): nonpurple
TranslationsEdit
colour
|
Democratic/Republican support
VerbEdit
purple (third-person singular simple present purples, present participle purpling, simple past and past participle purpled)
- (intransitive) To turn purple in colour.
- 1966, James Workman, The Mad Emperor, Melbourne, Sydney: Scripts, page 143:
- [T]he Capri cliffs, the tops of which were still pink against the purpling sky.
- (transitive) To dye purple.
- 1842, Alfred Tennyson, “The Day-Dream. The Sleeping Palace.”, in Poems. […], volume II, London: Edward Moxon, […], →OCLC, page 152:
- Year after year unto her feet, / She lying on her couch alone, / Across the purpled coverlet, / The maiden's jet-black hair has grown, […]
- (transitive) To clothe in purple.
Derived termsEdit
- American purple gallinule (Porphyrio martinicus)
- bepurple
- born in the purple
- French purple
- line of purples
- purple airway
- purple-backed sunbeam (Aglaeactis aliciae)
- purple-backed thornbill (Ramphomicron microrhynchum)
- purple-banded sunbird (Cinnyris bifasciatus)
- purple-bearded bee-eater, Celebes bee-eater (Meropogon forsteni)
- purple-bellied lory (Lorius hypoinochrous)
- purple bird
- purple-breasted cotinga (Cotinga cotinga)
- purple-breasted sunbird (Nectarinia purpureiventris)
- purple-capped fruit dove (Ptilinopus ponapensis)
- purple cochoa (Cochoa purpurea)
- purple copper ore
- purple-crested turaco (Tauraco porphyreolophus)
- purple-crowned fairy (Heliothryx barroti)
- purple-crowned fairy-wren (Malurus coronatus)
- purple dye murex
- purple finch (Haemorhous purpureus)
- purple gallinule (Porphyrio porphyrio)
- purple-gaped honeyeater (Lichenostomus cratitius)
- purple glossy starling (Lamprotornis purpureus)
- purple grackle
- purple-headed starling (Hylopsar purpureiceps)
- Purple Heart
- purpleheart (Peltogyne)
- purple heron (Ardea purpurea)
- purple honeycreeper (Cyanerpes caeruleus)
- purple indigobird (Vidua purpurascens)
- purple lettuce (Prenanthes purpurea)
- purple loosestrife (Lythrum salicaria)
- Purpleman
- purple martin (Progne subis)
- purple-naped lory (Lorius domicella)
- purple-naped sunbird (Hypogramma hypogrammicum)
- purple needletail (Hirundapus celebensis)
- purple of Cassius
- purple of mollusca
- purple passage
- purple patch
- purple plague
- purple prose
- purple quartz
- purple roller (Coracias naevius)
- purple roller (Eurystomus azureus)
- purple-rumped sunbird (Leptocoma zeylonica)
- purple sandpiper (Calidris maritima)
- purple shell
- purple starling (Lamprotornis purpureus)
- purple state
- purple sunbird (Cinnyris asiaticus)
- purple swamphen (Progne subis)
- purple-tailed imperial pigeon (Ducula rufigaster)
- purple-throated carib (Eulampis jugularis)
- purple-throated cotinga (Porphyrolaema porphyrolaema)
- purple-throated cuckooshrike (Campephaga quiscalina)
- purple-throated fruitcrow (Querula purpurata)
- purple-throated mountaingem (Lampornis calolaemus)
- purple-throated sunangel (Heliangelus viola)
- purple-throated sunbird (Leptocoma sperata)
- purple-throated woodstar (Calliphlox mitchellii)
- purple-winged ground dove (Claravis geoffroyi)
- purple-winged roller (Coracias temminckii)
- purple zone
- purpureal
- royal purple
- Tyrian purple
- velvet-purple coronet (Boissonneaua jardini)
- visual purple
See alsoEdit
white | gray, grey | black |
red; crimson | orange; brown | yellow; cream |
lime, lime green | green | mint |
cyan; teal | azure, sky blue | blue |
violet; indigo | magenta; purple | pink |
AnagramsEdit
Middle EnglishEdit
NounEdit
purple (uncountable)
- Alternative form of purpel
AdjectiveEdit
purple
- Alternative form of purpel