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color

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See also: colôr

English

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Alternative forms

Etymology

From Middle English colour, color, borrowed from Anglo-Norman colur, from Old French colour, color, from Latin color. Doublet of couleur.

Displaced English blee, Middle English blee (“color”), from Old English blēo. Also partially replaced Old English hīew (“color”) and its descendants (English hue), which is less often used in this sense.

The spelling color was popularized in modern American English by Noah Webster, to match the spelling of the word's Latin etymon, and make all American spellings of the derivatives consistent (colorimeter, coloration, colorize, colorless, etc).

Pronunciation

Noun

color (countable and uncountable, plural colors) (American spelling) (Canadian spelling, rare)

  1. (uncountable) The spectral composition of visible light.
    Humans and birds can perceive color.
    Synonym: (archaic) blee
  2. A subset thereof:
    1. (countable) A particular set of visible spectral compositions, perceived or named as a class.
      Most languages have names for the colors black, white, red, and green.
      Synonyms: hue, (archaic) blee
      • 1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter V, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC:
        Here, in the transept and choir, where the service was being held, one was conscious every moment of an increasing brightness; colours glowing vividly beneath the circular chandeliers, and the rows of small lights on the choristers' desks flashed and sparkled in front of the boys' faces, deep linen collars, and red neckbands.
    2. (uncountable) Hue as opposed to achromatic colors (black, white and grays).
      The accident victim's face was white, drained of all color.
      Synonyms: hue, shade, (archaic) blee
    3. These hues as used in color television or films, color photographs, etc (as opposed to the shades of grey used in black-and-white television).
      This film is broadcast in color.  Most people dream in color, but some dream in black and white.
      Synonym: color television
    4. (heraldry) Any of the standard dark tinctures used in a coat of arms, including azure, gules, sable, and vert.
      Coordinate terms: metal, stain
  3. A paint.
    The artist took out her colors and began work on a landscape.
  4. (uncountable) Human skin tone, especially as an indicator of race or ethnicity.
    Color has been a sensitive issue in many societies.
    Synonyms: complexion, ethnicity, race
  5. (medicine) Skin color, noted as normal, jaundiced, cyanotic, flush, mottled, pale, or ashen as part of the skin signs assessment.
  6. A flushed appearance of blood in the face; redness of complexion.
    • 1864, Sir Henry Stewart Cunningham, Late Laurels, volumes 1-2, page 117:
      […] her very embarrassment wore a graceful air; her high colour had softened down to a warm, delicate tint; and her dress, which looked beautifully new and fresh, was in good taste, and showed her off to advantage.
  8. (figuratively) Richness of expression; detail or flavour that is likely to generate interest or enjoyment.
    color commentator, color commentary
    There is a great deal of colour in his writing.
    a bit of local color
    • 1914 November, Louis Joseph Vance, “An Outsider […]”, in Munsey’s Magazine, volume LIII, number II, New York, N.Y.: The Frank A[ndrew] Munsey Company, […], published 1915, →OCLC, chapter I (Anarchy), page 377, column 2:
      Three chairs of the steamer type, all maimed, comprised the furniture of this roof-garden, with (by way of local color) on one of the copings a row of four red clay flower-pots filled with sun-baked dust […]
    Could you give me some color with regards to which products made up the mix of revenue for this quarter?
  9. A standard, flag, or insignia:
    1. (in the plural) A standard or banner.
      The loss of their colors destroyed the regiment's morale.
      Synonyms: banner, standard
    2. (in the plural) The flag of a nation or team.
      The colors were raised over the new territory.
      • 1856, “Treaty signed April 18, 1855; ratified April 5, 1856”, in Treaty of friendship and commerce between Great Britain and Siam, Bangkok: J. H. Chandler, page 7:
        The arrival of the British Consul at Bangkok shall not take place before the ratification of this Treaty, nor until ten vessels owned by British subjects, sailing under British colours and with British papers, shall have entered the port of Bangkok for purposes of trade, subsequent to the signing of this Treaty.
    3. (in the plural) Gang insignia.
      Both of the perpetrators were wearing colors.
  10. (in the plural) An award for sporting achievement, particularly within a school or university.
    He was awarded colors for his football.
  11. (military, in the plural) The morning ceremony of raising the flag.
  12. (physics) A property of quarks, with three values called red, green, and blue, which they can exchange by passing gluons; color charge.
  13. (finance, uncountable) A third-order measure of derivative price sensitivity, expressed as the rate of change of gamma with respect to time, or equivalently the rate of change of charm with respect to changes in the underlying asset price.
  14. (typography) The relative lightness or darkness of a mass of written or printed text on a page. (See type color on Wikipedia.Wikipedia )
  15. (snooker) Any of the colored balls excluding the reds.
  16. A front or facade; an ostensible truth actually false; pretext.
    • 2011, David Baldacci, The Collectors:
      At the far end of the continuum, Roger Seagraves collected personal items from people he'd murdered, or assassinated rather, since he'd done it under the color of serving his country.
  17. An appearance of right or authority; color of law.
    Under color of law, he managed to bilk taxpayers of millions of dollars.
    • 1882, The Ohio Law Journal, volume 2, page 396:
      The only thing which this defendant is accused of doing is that he excluded this boy from the school, and he did it under the color of the statute relating to the subject, and did it because he was a colored boy.
    • 1770, “Parliamentary Privilege Act 1770”, in legislation.gov.uk‎:
      no such action, suit, or any other process or proceeding thereupon shall at any time be impeached, stayed, or delayed by or under colour or pretence of any privilege of Parliament.
  18. (mining) Gold, particles of gold found when prospecting.
    • 2013, Eleanor Catton, The Luminaries, London: Granta, published 2014, →ISBN, page 184:
      He smelted Wells’s colour before it was valued, and by the time anybody saw it, it had been poured into bars and stamped with the Reserve seal.

Usage notes

  • In Canada, colour is preferred, but color is not unknown; in Australia, -our endings are the standard, although -or endings had some currency in the past and are still sporadically found in some regions. In New Zealand and South Africa, -our endings are the standard.

Synonyms

Hypernyms

  • (measure of derivative price sensitivity): Greeks (includes list of coordinate terms)

Hyponyms

Derived terms

The majority of these terms are either considered alternative forms of, or have alternative forms corresponding to, colour (the Commonwealth and Irish spelling).

Translations

The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.
Translations to be checked

Adjective

color (not comparable) (American spelling)

  1. Conveying color, as opposed to shades of gray.
    Color television and movies were considered a great improvement over black and white.
    • 1977, John Cheever, Falconer (A Borzoi Book), New York, N.Y.: Alfred A[braham] Knopf, →ISBN, page 209:
      I took my TV over on the first trip. I got a beauty. It's four years old, color, but when I had a little snow and asked the repairman to come in, he told me never, never turn this set in for a new one.

Translations

Verb

color (third-person singular simple present colors, present participle coloring, simple past and past participle colored) (American spelling)

  1. (transitive) To give something color.
    Synonyms: dye, paint, stain, shade, tinge, tint
    We could color the walls red.
    1. (transitive) To cause (a pipe, especially a meerschaum) to take on a brown or black color, by smoking.
  2. (intransitive) To apply colors to the areas within the boundaries of a line drawing using colored markers or crayons.
    Synonym: color in
    My kindergartener loves to color.
  3. (of a person or their face) To become red through increased blood flow.
    Synonym: blush
    Her face colored as she realized her mistake.
  4. To affect without completely changing.
    Synonyms: affect, influence
    That interpretation certainly colors my perception of the book.
  6. (informal) To attribute a quality to; to portray (as).
    Synonym: call
    Color me confused.
    They tried to colour the industrial unrest as a merely local matter.
  7. (mathematics, graph theory) To assign colors to the vertices of a graph (or the regions of a map) so that no two vertices connected by an edge (regions sharing a border) have the same color.
    Can this graph be 2-colored?
    You can color any map with four colors.

Antonyms

Hyponyms

Derived terms

Translations

The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.
Translations to be checked

See also

Colors/Colours in English (layout · text)
             red          orange              yellow              green              blue (incl.      indigo;
             cyan, teal, turquoise)		              purple / violet
         pink (including
         magenta)		          brown      white              gray/grey      black

Further reading

Anagrams

Aragonese

Etymology

Inherited from Latin colōrem.

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /koˈlo(ɾ)/
  • Rhymes: -o(ɾ)
  • Syllabification: co‧lor

Noun

color f

  1. color / colour

References

  • Bal Palazios, Santiago (2002) “color”, in Dizionario breu de a luenga aragonesa, Zaragoza, →ISBN
  • “color”, in Aragonario, diccionario aragonés–castellano (in Spanish)

Asturian

Alternative forms

Etymology

Inherited from Latin color, colōrem.

Noun

color m (plural colores)

  1. color, colour

Catalan

Etymology

Inherited from Latin colōrem. Compare Occitan color, French couleur.

Pronunciation

Noun

color m or (archaic, regional or poetic) f (plural colors)

  1. color, colour
  2. (poker) flush

Derived terms

See also

Colors in Catalan · colors (layout · text)
     blanc      gris      negre
             roig, vermell; carmesí              taronja; marró              groc; crema
             verd llima              verd             
             cian; xarxet              atzur              blau
             violat; indi              magenta; lila, porpra              rosa

Further reading

Galician

Alternative forms

Etymology

Inherited from Old Galician-Portuguese color, alternative form of coor, perhaps from an older forms collor (compare Asturian collor and color), from Latin color, colōrem.

Pronunciation

Noun

color f (plural colores)

  1. color / colour, hue
    • 1295, R. Lorenzo, La traducción gallega de la Crónica General y de la Crónica de Castilla, Ourense: I.E.O.P.F., page 745:
      diz que apareçeu ẽno çeo hũa cruz, que era de muytas colores et muy fremosa; et teuerõna os cristãos por muy boo sinal
      he says that a cross appeared in the sky, which was of many colors and very beauty; and the Christians considered it a very good sign
  2. flush (suffusion of the face with blood)

Derived terms

References

Italian

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /koˈlor/
  • Rhymes: -or
  • Hyphenation: co‧lór

Noun

color m (apocopated)

  1. Apocopic form of colore

Anagrams

Latin

Occitan

Old French

Old Galician-Portuguese

Old Occitan

Old Spanish

Romanian

Spanish

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