purple
purple Lexical Profile
purple Game Scores & Validity
• adjective
Of a color intermediate in hue between red and blue.
"The garden was filled with fragrant purple irises in late spring."
American Designating a political voting district or state with roughly equal support for both the Democratic (blue) and Republican (red) parties.
"Candidates spent weeks campaigning in purple states that could decide the election."
Written in an ornate, flowery, or overly elaborate style (used especially of prose or passages).
"The editor trimmed several paragraphs of purple prose from the manuscript."
• noun
Any of a range of colors or pigments intermediate in hue between red and blue.
"The artist mixed crimson and ultramarine to create a rich shade of purple."
Purple cloth or robes worn historically as an emblem of imperial, royal, or high ecclesiastical rank.
"As the son of the reigning emperor, the young prince was born to the purple."
• verb
To become or make purple in color.
"The distant mountain ridges slowly purpled as the sun sank below the horizon."
• Rhymes for purple
• Nearby Words
Word Origin & Etymology
From Old English purpul, altered by dissimilation from purpure, borrowed from Latin purpura ('purple dye' or 'purple cloth'), which came from Ancient Greek porphyra, the name of the marine murex snail from which prized Tyrian purple dye was extracted in antiquity.