amber
UK /ˈæm.bəː/ · US /ˈæm.bɚ/ noun, adjective, verb, proper noun
Forms ambers ambering ambered Ambar
- noun (obsolete) Ambergris, the waxy product of the sperm whale.
- noun Formerly thought to be the product of a plant.
- noun A hard, generally yellow to brown translucent or transparent fossil resin from extinct coniferous trees of the pine genus, used for jewellery, decoration and later dissolved as a binder in varnishes. One variety, blue amber, appears blue rather than yellow under direct sunlight.
- noun A yellow-orange colour.
- noun (UK, Commonwealth, Australia) The intermediate light in a set of three traffic lights, which when illuminated indicates that drivers should stop when safe to do so. See also yellow light.
- noun (biology, genetics, biochemistry) The stop codon (nucleotide triplet) "UAG", or a mutant which has this stop codon at a premature place in its DNA sequence. “an amber codon, an amber mutation, an amber suppressor”
- noun (uncountable) Hesitance to proceed, or limited approval to proceed; an amber light.
- adjective Of a brownish yellow colour, like that of most amber.
- verb (transitive, rare) To perfume or flavour with ambergris. “ambered wine, an ambered room”
- verb (transitive, rare) To preserve in amber. “an ambered fly”
- verb (transitive, rare, chiefly poetic or literary) To cause to take on the yellow colour of amber.
- verb (intransitive, rare, chiefly poetic or literary) To take on the yellow colour of amber.
- proper noun A female given name from English, popular in the 1980s and the 1990s.
- proper noun A surname of uncertain origin.
- proper noun A male given name from Hindi.
- proper noun A city in Rajasthan, India, also known as Amer.
- proper noun A river in Derbyshire, England, which joins the River Derwent at Ambergate.
- proper noun Synonym of Ambel (“language”).
Synonyms
Antonyms
Etymology
From Middle English ambre, aumbre, from Old French aumbre, ambre, from Arabic عَنْبَر (ʕanbar, “ambergris”), from Middle Persian 𐭠𐭭𐭡𐭫 (ʾnbl /ambar/, “ambergris”). Compare English lamber, ambergris. Displaced Middle English smulting (from Old English smelting (“amber”)), Old English eolhsand (“amber”), Old English glær (“amber”), and Old English sāp (“amber, resin, pomade”).
* The nucleotide sequence "UAG" is named "amber" for the first person to isolate the amber mutation, California Institute of Technology graduate student Harris Bernstein, whose last name ("Bernstein") is the German word for the resin "amber".
From amber, from Middle English ambre, from Old French ambre, from Latin ambar, from Arabic عَنْبَر (ʕanbar, “ambergris”).
Borrowed from Hindi अंबर (ambar).
From a pre-Celtic word.
Webster’s 1913
- noun A yellowish translucent resin resembling copal, found as a fossil in alluvial soils, with beds of lignite, or on the seashore in many places. It takes a fine polish, and is used for pipe mouthpieces, beads, etc., and as a basis for a fine varnish. By friction, it becomes strongly electric.
- noun Amber color, or anything amber-colored; a clear light yellow; as, the amber of the sky.
- adjective Consisting of amber; made of amber. "Amber bracelets." Shak.
- adjective Resembling amber, especially in color; amber-colored. "The amber morn." Tennyson.
Etymology [OE. aumbre, F. ambre, Sp. ámbar, and with the Ar. article, alámbar, fr. Ar. 'anbar ambergris.]
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “amber”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details