glow
Meanings
- To emit heat and light without a flame.
- Of a fire: to emit heat and light.
- To emit light brightly and steadily as if heated to a high temperature; to shine.
- To be very hot; also, to be on fire; to burn.
- Of a colour: to be bright; also, of a thing: to have a bright colour.
- Of a person: to display intense emotion.
- Of a person's body or a part of it: to feel hot and often to flush (“become suffused with a reddish colour”) as well, due to an emotional response, exertion, etc.
- To be involved in an (chiefly online) undercover sting operation, especially by American federal agencies.
- To create a threatening online post that may involve violence, and look suspicious enough to attract a police investigation.
- To emit (flame).
- To expose (someone) to the authorities.
- To make (something) hot; to heat.
- A state of heat and light being emitted by a hot object.
- A state of heat being emitted by a person or an animal's body.
- A state of light being emitted by something (for example, a bioluminescent animal or fungus, or a mineral) which is not hot; luminescence.
- A state of brightness or warmth of colour; specifically, a reddish colour on a person's face indicating health or youth; a flush.
- A condition of being passionate or having warm feelings; an ardour.
- To look intently; to stare.
Pronunciation
Word forms
Etymology
The verb is derived from Middle English glouen, glowen (“to give off heat and light without flame; of a thing: to be heated until red hot; to be brightly coloured; to shine brightly; (figurative) to be filled with emotion; of the face, etc.: to turn red, flush; etc.”), and then either: * from Old English glōwan (“to glow”) (a strong verb), from Proto-West Germanic *glōan (“to glow”); or * because the Middle English and modern English words are weak verbs, possibly from Old Norse *glówa, thought to be a variant of glóa (“to glow”), also a weak verb; both from Proto-Germanic *glōaną (“to glow”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰleh₁- (“to shine, glow; to be shining, glowing”). Possibly a doublet of glass. The noun is derived from the verb. cognates * Dutch gloeien * Finnish loistaa * German glühen * Norwegian glo * Old Norse glóa (Danish glo, Icelandic glóa, Swedish glo) * Saterland Frisian gloie, glöie, gluuje * West Frisian gloeie