Word of the Day

: January 6, 2011

aureate

adjective OR-ee-ut

What It Means

1 : of a golden color or brilliance

2 : marked by grandiloquent and rhetorical style

aureate in Context

Matthew tried to get into the novel that Stephanie had recommended, but he found reading the author's aureate prose too much of a slog.

"Still low over the flatland east, the sun threw long aureate light across the field." -- From Jeffrey Stepakoff's 2010 novel Fireworks Over Toccoa

Did You Know?

"Aureate" is among several adjectives in English pertaining to gold that derive from the Latin name for the metal, "aurum." While its relatives "auriferous" and "auric" are more likely to appear in scientific contexts to describe substances containing or made from gold (or "Au," to use its chemical symbol), "aureate" has tended to have a more literary allure since it was first used in English in the early 15th century. Over time, the word's use was extended from "golden" to "resplendent," and it finally lost some of its luster as it came to mean "grandiloquent."