dusk

1 the time from when the sun begins to set to the onset of total darkness we stopped playing at dusk, since it was getting too dark to see the ball Synonyms crepuscule (or crepuscle), eve, evenfall, evening, eventide, gloaming, night, nightfall, sundown, sunset, twilight Related Words dark, darkness, nighttime Near Antonyms day, daytime, light; forenoon Antonyms aurora, cockcrow, dawn, dawning, daybreak, daylight, morn, morning, sunrise, sunup

2 a time or place of little or no light legends of fearsome beasts living in the dusk of the great forest Synonyms black, blackness, candlelight, darkness, dark, gloaming, gloom, murk, night, semidarkness, shade, shadows, twilight, umbraRelated Words midnight; blackout, brownout, dimout; shadiness, umbrage; dullness (also dulness), somberness; cloudiness, fogginess, haziness, mistiness, murkiness; dimness, faintness, gloominess, grayness, paleness; half-lightNear Antonyms moonlight, starlight, sunlight; effulgence, radiance, radiancy, shine, sunshine; incandescence, luminance, luminescence, luminosity, luminousnessAntonyms blaze, brightness, brilliance, day, daylight, glare, glow, light, lightness

3 partial darkness due to the obstruction of light rays the forbidding dusk of Germany's famed Black Forest Synonyms shade, penumbra, shadiness, shadow, umbraRelated Words blackness, dimness, duskiness, gloom, gloominess, murkiness, obscurity, semidarkness, somberness; cloudinessNear Antonyms brightness, brilliance, effulgence, illumination, incandescence, light, lightness, lucidity, lucidness, luminance, luminosity, luminousness, radiance, radiancy

to grow dark the grief-stricken woman continued to sit in the dusking room until she was completely enveloped in darkness Synonyms blacken, black out, close in, darkenRelated Words dim, fade, wane; gloom, lower (also lour)Near Antonyms dawn; beam, glow, radiate, shineAntonyms brighten, light, lighten