overlight

See also: over light

English

Etymology 1

From over- +‎ light.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˌəʊvə(ɹ)ˈlaɪt/

  • Audio (Southern England):

    (file)

• Hyphenation: o‧ver‧light

Verb

overlight (third-person singular simple present overlights, present participle overlighting, simple past and past participle overlit or overlighted)

1. (transitive) To illuminate too brightly.
   • 2007 July 15, Andy Newman, “In Hospital Scrubs and Officer’s Blues, a Kinship”, in New York Times‎:

     Dozens of times over the next two years, Officer Yan’s work brought him through the sliding glass doors into the overlit clamor of Kings County’s emergency room, one of the busiest in the city.

2. (transitive) To illuminate from above.
   • 1981, William Irwin Thompson, The Time Falling Bodies Take to Light: Mythology, Sexuality and the Origins of Culture, London: Rider/Hutchinson & Co., page 215:

     Thus the stereotype is overlighted by the archetype, just as in conventional Egyptian statuary the historical pharoah is often shown standing under the god, the wings of Horus.

Etymology 2

From over- +‎ light.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈəʊvə(ɹ)ˌlaɪt/

  • Audio (Southern England):

    (file)

Noun

overlight (countable and uncountable, plural overlights)

1. excessive light
   • 1755, Samuel Johnson, A Dictionary of the English Language: In Which the Words Are Deduced From Their Originals, and Illustrated in Their Different Significations by Examples from the Best Writers. To Which Are Prefixed, A History of the Language, and an English Grammar‎, Strahan, J. and P. Knapton, page 3:

     An overlight maketh the eyes dazzle, insomuch as perpetual looking against the fun would cause blindness.

   • 1906, Mr. Yorick, The Theosophist, Volume 27‎, Theosophical Publishing House, page 700:

     "The Lecture Hall was very tastefully decorated with palms and evergreens and the platform on which the statue of H. B. Blavatsky is placed had several wreaths of lotus flowers beautifully arrayed and the statue itself was bedecked with a profusion of the choicest lotuses and shone out, to great advantage, under the overlight which shed its subdued lustre amid the foliage round it.

   • 1909, Eugénie Paul Jefferson, Intimate Recollections of Joseph Jefferson‎, Dodd, Mead & Company, page 41:

     Upon entering the dining-room, the painting faced one from the opposite end of the room, receiving light from a large landscape window on the left, and an overlight of electricity by night, the room being otherwise in darkness.

   • 1921, Mr. Yorick, The National Geographic Magazine, Volume 39‎, National Geographic Society, page 114:

     "When a few hundred gaily-colored aprons—bright green, changeable to gold, yellow with a silver overlight, pink, blue, cerise—are displayed in one moving picture, it is a very charming scene."

   • 1952, John Steinbeck, East of Eden and the Wayward Bus‎, Viking Press, page 484:

     "Cal stood on the neat porch and kept his finger on the bell until the harsh overlight flashed on and the night bolt rasped and Mrs. Bacon looked out.

Etymology 3

From Middle English over-lyght, equivalent to over- +‎ light.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˌəʊvə(ɹ)ˈlaɪt/

  • Audio (Southern England):

    (file)

Adjective

overlight (comparative more overlight, superlative most overlight)

1. (dated) Too light or frivolous; giddy.

Derived terms

• overlightly