aureole

See also: auréole, auréolé, and Aureole

English

Etymology

From Middle English aureole, from Old French aureole, from Medieval Latin aureola (corona) ("golden (crown)").

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈɔːriːəʊl/
• (US) IPA^(key): /ˈɔːriːoʊl/
• Homophone: oriole

Noun

aureole (plural aureoles)

1. A circle of light or halo around the head of a deity or a saint.
   • 1859, George Meredith, The Ordeal of Richard Feverel, Chapter 16:

     The lady's hair no woman could possess without feeling it her pride. It was the daily theme of her lady's-maid,—a natural aureole to her head.

   • 1915, W.S. Maugham, "Of Human Bondage", chapter 122:

     They sat quietly, side by side, without speaking. Philip enjoyed having her near him. He was warmed by her radiant health. A glow of life seemed like an aureole to shine about her.

   • 1916, Edwin Arllington Robinson, The Man Against the Sky, "The Voice of Age":

     She feels, with all our furniture,

     Room yet for something more secure

     Than our self-kindled aureoles

     To guide our poor forgotten souls […]

   • 2004, Andrea Levy, Small Island, London: Review, Chapter Four, p. 69,^[1]

     Those white women whose superiority encircled them like an aureole, could quieten any raucous gathering by just placing a finger to a lip.

2. (by extension) Any luminous or colored ring that encircles something.
   • 1949, George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty-Four, Part One, Chapter 1,^[2]

     It was a lean Jewish face, with a great fuzzy aureole of white hair and a small goatee beard […]

3. (astronomy) A corona.
4. (geology) A ring around an igneous intrusion.
   • 1990, Roger Mason, Petrology of the Metamorphic Rocks, Chapter 3: "Metamorphism associated with igneous intrusions":

     Cleavage and folds are imprinted are overprinted by the contact metamorphic aureole, indicating that they belong to a pre-intrustive episode of rock deformation and accompanying regional deformation.

Derived terms

• aureolate
• inaureole

Translations

circle of light or halo around the head of a deity

• Catalan: aurèola (ca) f
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 圓光 (zh), 圆光 (zh) (yuánguāng)

• Finnish: sädekehä (fi)
• French: auréole (fr) f
• German: Heiligenschein (de) m, Aureole f
• Japanese: 後光 (ごこう, gokō)
• Korean: 후광 (ko) (hugwang)

• Maori: wāhi pupango (zone around the nipple)
• Polish: aureola (pl) f
• Romanian: nimb (ro) n, aureolă (ro) f
• Russian: орео́л (ru) m (oreól), нимб (ru) m (nimb)
• Serbo-Croatian:

  Cyrillic: ореол m, нимбус m

  Roman: oreol (sh) m, nimbus (sh) m

References

• “aureole” in Dictionary.com Unabridged, Dictionary.com, LLC, 1995–present.
• "aureole" in the Wordsmyth Dictionary-Thesaurus (Wordsmyth, 2002)
• "aureole" in Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary (Cambridge University Press, 2007)
• “aureole” in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press.
• Oxford English Dictionary, second edition (1989)
• Random House Webster's Unabridged Electronic Dictionary (1987-1996)

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Italian

Noun

aureole f

1. plural of aureola

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Latin

Adjective

aureole

1. vocative masculine singular of aureolus

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Portuguese

Verb

aureole

1. first-person singular (eu) present subjunctive of aureolar
2. third-person singular (ele and ela, also used with você and others) present subjunctive of aureolar
3. third-person singular (você) affirmative imperative of aureolar
4. third-person singular (você) negative imperative of aureolar

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Spanish

Verb

aureole

1. First-person singular (yo) present subjunctive form of aureolar.
2. Formal second-person singular (usted) present subjunctive form of aureolar.
3. Third-person singular (él, ella, also used with usted^?) present subjunctive form of aureolar.
4. Formal second-person singular (usted) imperative form of aureolar.