Half-blue


[bloo] /blu/

noun
1.
the pure color of a clear sky; the primary color between green and violet in the visible spectrum, an effect of light with a wavelength between 450 and 500 nm.
2.
.
3.
something having a blue color:
Place the blue next to the red.
4.
a person who wears blue or is a member of a group characterized by some blue symbol:
Tomorrow the blues will play the browns.
5.
(often initial capital letter) a member of the Union army in the American Civil War or the army itself.
Compare 1 (def 13).
6.
.
7.
(def 1).
8.
any of several blue-winged butterflies of the family Lycaenidae.
9.
Printing. .
10.
the blue.

adjective, bluer, bluest.
11.
of the color of blue:
a blue tie.
12.
(initial capital letter) of or relating to the Union army in the American Civil War.
13.
(of the skin) discolored by cold, contusion, fear, or vascular collapse.
14.
depressed in spirits; dejected; melancholy:
She felt blue about not being chosen for the team.
15.
holding or offering little hope; dismal; bleak:
a blue outlook.
16.
characterized by or stemming from rigid morals or religion:
statutes that were blue and unrealistic.
17.
marked by blasphemy:
The air was blue with oaths.
18.
(of an animal’s pelage) grayish-blue.
19.
indecent; somewhat obscene; risqué:
a blue joke or film.
verb (used with object), blued, bluing or blueing.
20.
to make blue; dye a blue color.
21.
to tinge with bluing:
Don’t blue your clothes till the second rinse.
verb (used without object), blued, bluing or blueing.
22.
to become or turn blue.
Idioms
23.
blue in the face, exhausted and speechless, as from excessive anger, physical strain, etc.:
I reminded him about it till I was blue in the face.
24.
out of the blue, suddenly and unexpectedly:
The inheritance came out of the blue as a stroke of good fortune.
noun
1.
(at Oxford and Cambridge universities) a sportsman who substitutes for a full blue or who represents the university in a minor sport Compare blue (sense 4)
/bluː/
noun
1.
any of a group of colours, such as that of a clear unclouded sky, that have wavelengths in the range 490–445 nanometres. Blue is the complementary colour of yellow and with red and green forms a set of primary colours related adjective cyanic
2.
a dye or pigment of any of these colours
3.
blue cloth or clothing: dressed in blue
4.

5.
(Brit) an informal name for Tory
6.
any of numerous small blue-winged butterflies of the genera Lampides, Polyommatus, etc: family Lycaenidae
7.
(archaic) short for bluestocking
8.
(slang) a policeman
9.
(archery) a blue ring on a target, between the red and the black, scoring five points
10.
a blue ball in snooker, etc
11.
another name for blueing
12.
(Austral & NZ, slang) an argument or fight: he had a blue with a taxi driver
13.
(Austral & NZ, slang) Also bluey. a court summons, esp for a traffic offence
14.
(Austral & NZ, informal) a mistake; error
15.
out of the blue, apparently from nowhere; unexpectedly: the opportunity came out of the blue
16.
into the blue, into the unknown or the far distance
adjective bluer, bluest
17.
of the colour blue
18.
(of the flesh) having a purple tinge, as from cold or contusion
19.
depressed, moody, or unhappy
20.
dismal or depressing: a blue day
21.
indecent, titillating, or pornographic: blue films
22.
bluish in colour or having parts or marks that are bluish: a blue fox, a blue whale
23.
(rare) aristocratic; noble; patrician: a blue family See blue blood
24.
(US) relating to, supporting, or representing the Democratic Party Compare red1 (sense 18)
verb blues, blueing, bluing, blued
25.
to make, dye, or become blue
26.
(transitive) to treat (laundry) with blueing
27.
(transitive) (slang) to spend extravagantly or wastefully; squander
/bluː/
noun
1.
(Austral, informal) a nickname for a person with red hair

c.1300, bleu, blwe, etc., from Old French blo “pale, pallid, wan, light-colored; blond; discolored; blue, blue-gray,” from Frankish *blao or some other Germanic source, from Proto-Germanic *blæwaz (cf. Old English blaw, Old Saxon and Old High German blao, Danish blaa, Swedish blå, Old Frisian blau, Middle Dutch bla, Dutch blauw, German blau “blue”), from PIE *bhle-was “light-colored, blue, blond, yellow,” from PIE root bhel- (1) “to shine, flash” (see bleach (v.)).

The same PIE root yielded Latin flavus “yellow,” Old Spanish blavo “yellowish-gray,” Greek phalos “white,” Welsh blawr “gray,” Old Norse bla “livid” (the meaning in black and blue), showing the usual slippery definition of color words in Indo-European The present spelling is since 16c., from French influence (Modern French bleu).

The exact color to which the Gmc. term applies varies in the older dialects; M.H.G. bla is also ‘yellow,’ whereas the Scandinavian words may refer esp. to a deep, swarthy black, e.g. O.N. blamaðr, N.Icel. blamaður ‘Negro’ [Buck]

Few words enter more largely into the composition of slang, and colloquialisms bordering on slang, than does the word BLUE. Expressive alike of the utmost contempt, as of all that men hold dearest and love best, its manifold combinations, in ever varying shades of meaning, greet the philologist at every turn. [John S. Farmer, “Slang and Its Analogues Past and Present,” 1890, p.252]

The color of constancy since Chaucer at least, but apparently for no deeper reason than the rhyme in true blue (c.1500). From early times blue was the distinctive color of the dress of servants, which may be the reason police uniforms are blue, a tradition Farmer dates to Elizabethan times. For blue ribbon see cordon bleu under cordon. Blue whale attested from 1851, so called for its color. The flower name blue bell is recorded by 1570s. Blue streak, of something resembling a blt of lightning (for quickness, intensity, etc.) is from 1830, U.S. Western slang.

Many Indo-European languages seem to have had a word to describe the color of the sea, encompasing blue and green and gray; e.g. Irish glass (see Chloe); Old English hæwen “blue, gray,” related to har (see hoar); Serbo-Croatian sinji “gray-blue, sea-green;” Lithuanian šyvas, Russian sivyj “gray.”

“lewd, indecent” recorded from 1840 (in form blueness, in an essay of Carlyle’s); the sense connection is unclear, and is opposite to that in blue laws (q.v.). John Mactaggart’s “Scottish Gallovidian Encyclopedia” (1824) containing odd words he had learned while growing up in Galloway and elsewhere in Scotland, has an entry for Thread o’Blue, “any little smutty touch in song-singing, chatting, or piece of writing.” Farmer [“Slang and Its Analogues Past and Present,” 1890] offers the theory that this meaning derives from the blue dress uniforms issued to harlots in houses of correction, but he writes that the earlier slang authority John Camden Hotten “suggests it as coming from the French Bibliothèque Bleu, a series of books of very questionable character,” and adds, from Hotten, that, “Books or conversation of an entirely opposite nature are said to be Brown or Quakerish, i.e., serious, grave, decent.”
v.

“to make blue,” c.1600, from blue (1).

adjective

noun

Related Terms

heavenly blue

generally associated with purple (Ex. 25:4; 26:1, 31, 36, etc.). It is supposed to have been obtained from a shellfish of the Mediterranean, the Helix ianthina of Linnaeus. The robe of the high priest’s ephod was to be all of this colour (Ex. 28:31), also the loops of the curtains (26:4) and the ribbon of the breastplate (28:28). Blue cloths were also made for various sacred purposes (Num. 4:6, 7, 9, 11, 12). (See COLOUR.)

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  • Half-boiled

    [boild] /bɔɪld/ adjective, Slang. 1. . adjective Related Terms hard-boiled, hard-boiled egg

  • Half-boot

    noun 1. a boot reaching about halfway to the knee. noun 1. a boot reaching to the midcalf

  • Half-bottle

    noun 1. a bottle half the size of a standard bottle of wine, spirits, etc

  • Half-bound

    [haf-bound, hahf-] /ˈhæfˌbaʊnd, ˈhɑf-/ adjective 1. bound in half binding. adjective 1. (of a book) having a half-binding


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