scarlet
Americannoun
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a bright-red color inclining toward orange.
-
cloth or clothing of this color.
adjective
-
of the color scarlet.
-
flagrantly offensive.
Their sins were scarlet.
noun
-
a vivid red colour, sometimes with an orange tinge
-
cloth or clothing of this colour
adjective
-
of the colour scarlet
-
sinful or immoral, esp unchaste
Etymology
Origin of scarlet
1200–50; Middle English < Old French escarlate < Medieval Latin scarlata, scarletum, perhaps < Arabic saqirlāṭ, siqillāṭ < Medieval Greek sigillátos < Latin sigillātus decorated with patterns in relief; sigillate
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
I had been far too shy to ask the teacher what it meant, and Mama had blushed scarlet when I consulted her.
From Literature
Looking down into his father’s eyes, he saw the tiny scarlet veins, and at the centers, the fathomless dark.
From Literature
I felt my face turn scarlet with anger.
From Literature
I put some scarlet runner beans from the Hollywood Farmers Market over it to symbolize the gathering cultures of Native American tribes.
From Los Angeles Times
In the film, Huppert's countess character returns to life in a scarlet red funeral barge sailing into in the Seegrotte, an underground Viennese lake popular with tourists.
From Barron's
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
