brightsome
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English
[edit]Etymology
[edit]Adjective
[edit]brightsome (comparative more brightsome, superlative most brightsome)
- (archaic) Marked by brightness or brilliance; resplendent in appearance; shining.
- c. 1589–1590 (date written), Christopher Marlo[we], edited by Tho[mas] Heywood, The Famous Tragedy of the Rich Iew of Malta. […], London: […] I[ohn] B[eale] for Nicholas Vavasour, […], published 1633, →OCLC, Act II:
- But rather let the brightsome heavens be dim,
And nature's beauty choke with stifling clouds,
Than my fair Abigail should frown on me.
- 1869, R. D. Blackmore, chapter 45, in Lorna Doone: A Romance of Exmoor:
- [A]ll the shifts of cloud and sun, all the difference between black death and brightsome liveliness, scarcely may suggest or equal Lorna's transformation.
- 1922, Thomas Hardy, “The Wood Fire”, in Late Lyrics and Earlier:
- This is a brightsome blaze you've lit good friend, to-night!
- 2010, William Bay, Fun with Strums Mandolin:
- Her hair it was of a brightsome color, [...]
- 2014, Barbara Kiefer Lewalski, Protestant Poetics and the Seventeenth-Century Religious Lyric:
- “[...] this point, characteristically, the speaker writes himself into the relation: his dull skin requires the “brightsome Colours” of Joseph's coat but more especially of Christ's blood and glory.”
Usage notes
[edit]- The Oxford English Dictionary suggests that this is a less definite term than bright, "leaving more to the imagination".[1]
Synonyms
[edit]Derived terms
[edit]References
[edit]- “brightsome”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
- ^ Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., 1989.