saccharine

English

WOTD – 1 December 2020

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈsækəɹaɪn/, /-ɹɪn/, /-ɹiːn/, /ˈsækɹɪn/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈsækəɹɪn/, /-ɹən/, /ˈsækɹɪn/

• Audio (AU)

  (file)

• Homophone: saccharin
• Hyphenation: sac‧cha‧rine

Etymology 1

From New Latin saccharum (“sugar”) + English -ine (suffix meaning ‘of or pertaining to’ forming adjectives). Saccharum is derived from saccharon (“syrupy liquid from bamboo or reeds”), from Ancient Greek σάκχαρον (sákkharon), from Pali sakkharā (“sugar; gravel; granule, grain; crystal; potsherd”), from Sanskrit शर्करा (śárkarā, “ground or candied sugar; cotton sugar, sugarmaple; gravel, grit, pebbles; potsherd”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *ḱorkeh₂ (“boulder; gravel”).

Adjective

saccharine (comparative more saccharine, superlative most saccharine)

1. (dated) Of or relating to sugar; sugary.

   Synonym: (archaic, rare) saccharous

2. (dated) Containing a large or excessive amount of sugar.

   Synonyms: cloying, sickly, sickly sweet

3. (figurative, derogatory) Excessively sweet in action or disposition, especially if romantic or sentimental to the point of ridiculousness; sickly sweet, syrupy.

   Synonyms: cloying, precious, saccharined, sickly, twee

   Antonym: nonsaccharine

4. (chiefly botany, geology) Resembling granulated sugar; saccharoid.

Derived terms

• mucoso-saccharine
• nonsaccharine
• saccharined (adjective)
• saccharinely
• saccharinity

Translations

of or relating to sugar — see also sugary

• Arabic: سُكَّرِيّ (sukkariyy)
• Bulgarian: захарен (zaharen)
• Catalan: sacarí
• Dutch: suikerachtig (nl)
• Icelandic: sætur (is)
• Italian: saccarifero, saccarino
• Latin: saccharīnus
• Portuguese: sacarino
• Romanian: mieros (ro)
• Russian: при́торный (ru) (prítornyj)
• Serbo-Croatian:

  Cyrillic: саха̀рӣнскӣ

  Roman: sahàrīnskī (sh)

• Spanish: sacarino

containing a large or excessive amount of sugar

excessively sweet, especially if romantic or sentimental to the point of ridiculousness

• Bulgarian: сладникав (sladnikav)
• Dutch: sacharine (nl), honingzoet (nl), mierzoet (nl), weeïg (nl), zoetsappig (nl)
• Finnish: imelä (fi), siirappinen
• French: cucul la praline (fr), fleur bleue (fr)
• German: süßlich (de)
• Italian: dolciastro (it) m, mieloso (it) m, sdolcinato (it) m, smielato (it) m, stucchevole (it), svenevole (it), zuccheroso (it) m
• Maori: āwenewene
• Polish: ckliwy (pl)
• Romanian: dulceag (ro), mieros (ro)
• Russian: при́торный (ru) (prítornyj)
• Serbo-Croatian:

  Cyrillic: саха̀рӣнскӣ

  Roman: sahàrīnskī (sh)

• Spanish: cursi (es), dulzón (es), empalagoso (es), meloso m, pasteloso m (Spain), sensiblero m
• Swedish: sötsliskig (sv)

resembling granulated sugar — see saccharoid

See also

• Thesaurus:sweet

Noun

saccharine (uncountable)

1. (dated) Something which is saccharine or sweet; sugar.
2. (figurative) Sentimentalism.
   • 1960, H[erbert] E[rnest] Bates, An Aspidistra in Babylon: Four Novellas, London: Michael Joseph, →OCLC, page 31:

     If Captain Archie Blaine regarded these outpourings as so much adolescent saccharine he never revealed it by a single word, a smile or the flicker of an eye.

Translations

something which is saccharine or sweet — see sugar

sentimentalism — see sentimentalism

Etymology 2

From saccharin +‎ -ine (suffix meaning ‘of or pertaining to’ forming adjectives).

Adjective

saccharine (not comparable)

1. Of or relating to saccharin (“a white, crystalline powder, C₇H₅NO₃S, used as an artificial sweetener in food products”).

Derived terms

• saccharinic

Translations

of or relating to saccharin

Etymology 3

A variant of saccharin.

Noun

saccharine (plural saccharines)

1. Alternative spelling of saccharin

French

Alternative forms

• saccarine (post-1990 spelling)

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /sa.ka.ʁin/

• Audio

  (file)

Noun

saccharine f (plural saccharines)

1. saccharin

Further reading

• “saccharine”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

Latin

Adjective

saccharīne

1. vocative masculine singular of saccharīnus