verdant

adjective ver·dant \ ˈvər-dᵊnt \

|Updated on: 12 Jul 2018

Editor's Note: Did You Know?

Definition of verdant

1 a : green in tint or color

b : green with growing plants

verdant fields

2 : unripe in experience or judgment : green 9a

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verdancy

play \ˈvər-dᵊn(t)-sē\ noun

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verdantly

play \ˈvər-dᵊnt-lē\ adverb

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Recent Examples of verdant from the Web

In rainy, verdant 2010, Van der Lee and his wife, Monique, purchased a distressed vineyard in Temecula.

— nicole miller-coleman, sandiegouniontribune.com, "As attention on Vinduino grows, so does its market," 7 July 2018
Decorate with fragrant potted trees and topiaries to bring a verdant atmosphere into your home, turning your living room into an interactive game room.

— ELLE Decor, "Now *This* Is How You Throw a Grown-Up Pool Party," 6 July 2018
Their dreams of a verdant West needed to be tempered and shaped to reality.

— john f. ross, Smithsonian, "The Visionary John Wesley Powell Had a Plan for Developing the West, But Nobody Listened," 3 July 2018
Nearly two centuries later, Cincinnati pride remains strong — and for good reason — since the riverfront city is overflowing with gorgeous architecture, verdant green space, eye-popping public art and a surging food scene.

— annie zaleski, Cincinnati.com, "See Cincinnati with fresh eyes and visit these 7 postcard-worthy sites," 29 June 2018
Still verdant farm country, this part of New York is home to a growing community of Old Order Amish and Mennonites, who run produce stands and stores like the Quilt Shop and Oak Hill Bulk Foods, which easily has 15 kinds of flour.

— alison humes, WSJ, "Summer Getaways That You Don’t Need To Sweat Over," 28 June 2018
Housing options are many — and often verdant and shady amid the city’s many live oaks.

— a.d. thompson, OrlandoSentinel.com, "Longwood Neighborhood Guide," 21 June 2018
The installation was indeed full of surprises like living portraits, where guests could pose amidst verdant ferns, and a performance by the Battery Dance group.

— elise taylor, Vogue, "Inside the Making of Kate Young’s Wild Garden for Maison St-Germain," 22 June 2018
Summer visitors to the Eastern High Sierra may notice this remote mountain range, but only a handful of visitors go there compared to the hordes that fish, hike, or simply relax in the more verdant Sierra Nevada Mountains to the west.

— ernie cowan, sandiegouniontribune.com, "Wonders await in the White Mountains," 16 June 2018

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'verdant.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

Did You Know?

English speakers have been using "verdant" as a ripe synonym of "green" since the late 16th century, and as a descriptive term for inexperienced or naive people since the 1820s. (By contrast, the more experienced "green" has colored our language since well before the 12th century, and was first applied to inexperienced people in the 1540s.) "Verdant" is derived from the Old French word for "green," vert, which in turn is from Latin virērē, meaning "to be green." Today, "vert" is used in English as a word for green forest vegetation and the heraldic color green. Another descendant of "virere" is the adjective virescent, meaning "beginning to be green."

Origin and Etymology of verdant

contracted from Middle French verdoyant, from present participle of verdoyer "to be green, turn green," going back to Old French verdoier, from verd, vert "green" (going back to Latin viridis, from a base *wir-, whence virēre "to show green growth, be green" of uncertain origin) + -oier, factitive verb suffix, going back to Latin -idiāre, originally representing variant pronunciation (or spelling variant) of -izāre -ize

Note: Latin viridis and virēre have been linked to Lithuanian visti "to multiply, breed," veisti "to breed, rear," as well as to Old English wīse "sprout, stalk," Old High German wisa "meadow," though the semantic connections are vague enough to make this a very tenuous hypothesis.

NEW! Time Traveler

First Known Use: 1581

in the meaning defined at sense 1a

See Words from the same year