grey
From Wiktionary, the free dictionary
See also: Grey
Alternative forms
- gray (often used in the US)
Etymology
From Middle English grey, from Old English grǣġ, from Proto-Germanic *grēwaz (compare Dutch grauw, German grau, Old Norse grár), from Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰreh₁- (“to green, to grow”) (compare Latin rāvus (“grey”), Old Church Slavonic зьрѭ (zĭrjǫ, “to see, to glance”), Russian зреть (zretʹ, “to watch, to look at”) (archaic), Lithuanian žeriù (“to shine”)).
Pronunciation
Adjective
grey (comparative greyer or more grey, superlative greyest or most grey)
- British and Commonwealth standard spelling of gray.
- 1704, I[saac] N[ewton], “(please specify |book=1 to 3)”, in Opticks: Or, A Treatise of the Reflexions, Refractions, Inflexions and Colours of Light. […], London: […] Sam[uel] Smith, and Benj[amin] Walford, printers to the Royal Society, […], →OCLC:
- These grey and dun colors may be also produced by mixing whites and blacks.
- (South Africa, slang) Synonym of coloured (pertaining to the mixed race of black and white).[1]
Derived terms
- all cats are grey at night
- all cats are grey by night
- all cats are grey in the dark
- ash-grey
- ash grey
- battleship-grey
- battleship grey
- blue-grey
- brain grey
- cadet grey
- code grey
- cool grey
- dove grey
- eastern grey kangaroo
- French grey
- get grey hair from
- give grey hair to
- give someone grey hair
- great grey owl
- great grey shrike
- grey alder
- grey alien
- grey amber
- grey ammonia
- grey area
- greyback
- grey-backed fiscal
- greybeard
- grey belt
- grey-blue
- greyboard
- greybody
- grey-box testing
- grey-capped greenfinch
- grey cells
- grey club-rush
- grey-collar
- grey corkwood
- grey crested tit
- grey crow
- grey crowned crane
- grey eminence
- greyen
- greyer
- greyest
- greyey
- grey folk
- grey francolin
- greyfriar
- grey friar
- grey ghost
- grey gold
- grey goo
- grey-haired
- grey-hat
- grey hat
- greyhead
- grey-headed
- grey-headed bunting
- grey-headed chickadee
- grey-headed woodpecker
- grey hen
- grey heron
- grey-hooded attila
- grey-hooded bunting
- greyhound
- grey hydrogen
- greyish
- greyishly
- grey jay
- grey junglefowl
- greylag
- grey-legged tinamou
- greyline
- greylist
- grey literature
- greyly
- grey magic
- grey magick
- grey market
- grey marketeer
- grey matter
- grey mullet
- grey-necked bunting
- grey-necked wood rail
- greyness
- grey night
- grey noddy
- grey noise
- grey nomad
- grey nurse
- grey nurse shark
- grey out
- grey ox
- grey partridge
- grey platelet syndrome
- grey plover
- grey pound
- grey power
- grey rape
- grey red-backed vole
- grey reef shark
- grey rhea
- grey rocking
- grey rock method
- grey-scale
- greyscale
- grey scale
- greyschist
- grey seal
- greystone
- grey-tailed tattler
- grey teal
- grey ternlet
- grey-throated rail
- grey tinamou
- grey tit
- Grey Tribe
- grey wagtail
- grey warbler
- greyware
- grey water
- greywater
- greywether
- grey whale
- grey-winged trumpeter
- grey wolf
- grey zorro
- gunmetal-grey
- gunmetal grey
- lesser grey shrike
- military grey
- Patagonian grey fox
- Payne's grey
- pearl grey
- pinko-grey
- silver-grey
- slate grey
- South American grey fox
- the fox may grow grey but never good
- the grey mare is the better horse
- ungrey
- western grey kangaroo
- wolf-grey
Translations
gray — see gray
Verb
grey (third-person singular simple present greys, present participle greying, simple past and past participle greyed)
- British and Commonwealth standard spelling of gray.
- 1941, Emily Carr, chapter 18, in Klee Wyck:
- Now only a few hand-hewn cedar planks and roof beams remained, moss-grown and sagging—a few totem poles, greyed and split.
Noun
grey (plural greys)
- British and Commonwealth standard spelling of gray.
- 1810, Walter Scott, “(please specify the canto number or page)”, in The Lady of the Lake; […], Edinburgh: […] [James Ballantyne and Co.] for John Ballantyne and Co.; London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, and Orme, and William Miller, →OCLC, (please specify the stanza number):
- Woe worth the chase, woe worth the day, / That costs thy life, my gallant grey.
- 1833, Sporting Magazine, volume 6, page 400:
- Pioneer seemed now to have the game in his own hands; but the Captain, by taking two desperate leaps, cut off a corner, by which he regained the ground he had lost by the fall, and was up with the grey the remainder of the chase.
Translations
gray — see gray
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 | ||
References
- 2001, Charlotte Spinks, A New Apartheid? Urban Spatiality, (Fear of) Crime, and Segregation; in Cape Town, South Africa, Destin Development Studies Institute, ISSN 1470-2320
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