English Explanatory Dictionary

twilight

English dictionary entry

Meanings

noun
  1. The soft light in the sky seen before the rising and (especially) after the setting of the sun, occasioned by the illumination of the earth’s atmosphere by the direct rays of the sun and their reflection on the earth.
  2. The time when said light is visible; the period between daylight and darkness.
  3. Any faint light through which something is seen.
  4. The time when the sun is less than 18° below the horizon.
  5. An in-between or fading condition through which something is perceived.
adj
  1. Pertaining to or resembling twilight; faintly illuminated; obscure.
  2. Synonym of mesopelagic (“Describing the pelagic zone of the ocean between the photic epipelagic and the aphotic bathypelagic zones, characterized by very minimal light.”)
verb
  1. To illuminate faintly.

Pronunciation

/ˈtwaɪˌlaɪt/ en-us-twilight.ogg

Word forms

twilight twilights twilighting twilit twilighted

Etymology

PIE word *dwóh₁ From Middle English twilight, twyelyghte, equivalent to twi- (“double, half-”) + light, literally ‘second light, half-light’. Cognate to Scots twa licht, twylicht, twielicht (“twilight”), Low German twilecht, twelecht (“twilight”), Dutch tweelicht (“twilight, dusk”), German Zwielicht (“twilight, dusk”). Compare Old English twēone lēoht (“twilight”).

Synonyms

gloaming crepuscule crepusculum dimmet evenglome glooming tweenlight twilight half-light blue hour mesopelagic

Related words

daytime nighttime golden hour crepuscular

Derived words

twilight anesthesia twilight birth twilight industry twilightish twilight language Twilight of the Gods twilights twilight shift twilight sleep twilighty twilight years twilight zone twilit
This entry uses open data from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA/GFDL). Word forms are used for search and are not indexed as separate pages.
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