Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun The achromatic color of maximum lightness; the color of objects that reflect nearly all light of all visible wavelengths; the complement or antagonist of black, the other extreme of the neutral gray series. Although typically a response to maximum stimulation of the retina, the perception of white appears always to depend on contrast.
  • noun The white or nearly white part, as.
  • noun The albumen of an egg.
  • noun The white part of an eyeball.
  • noun A blank or unprinted area, as of an advertisement.
  • noun One that is white or nearly white, as.
  • noun Pieces of laundry having a white or nearly white color.
  • noun White trousers or a white outfit of a special nature.
  • noun The white dress uniform of the US Navy or Coast Guard.
  • noun A white wine.
  • noun A white pigment.
  • noun A white breed, species, or variety of animal.
  • noun Any of various butterflies of the subfamily Pierinae, characteristically having chiefly white wings often with black markings.
  • noun A member of a racial group having light-colored skin, especially when of European origin and in some classifications also when of Middle Eastern or North African origin.
  • noun Products of a white color, such as flour, salt, and sugar.
  • noun The white or light-colored pieces, as in chess.
  • noun The player using these pieces.
  • noun The outermost ring of an archery target.
  • noun A hit in this ring.
  • noun Medicine Leukorrhea.
  • noun A member of a conservative or counterrevolutionary faction, especially one opposing the Bolsheviks in the Russian civil war.
  • adjective Being of the color white; devoid of hue, as new snow.
  • adjective Approaching the color white, as.
  • adjective Weakly colored; almost colorless; pale.
  • adjective Pale gray; silvery and lustrous.
  • adjective Bloodless; blanched.
  • adjective Light or whitish in color or having light or whitish parts. Used with animal and plant names.
  • adjective Of or belonging to a racial group of people having light-colored skin, especially when of European origin, and in some classifications also when of Middle Eastern or North African origin.
  • adjective Habited in white.
  • adjective Accompanied by or mantled with snow.
  • adjective Incandescent.
  • adjective Intensely heated; impassioned.
  • adjective Of or relating to a conservative or counterrevolutionary faction, especially one opposing the Bolsheviks in the Russian civil war.
  • adjective With milk added. Used of tea or coffee.
  • adjective Archaic Unsullied; pure.
  • transitive verb Printing To cover or make illegible with white coloring. Often used with out.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • To grow white; whiten.
  • To make white.
  • To make pale or pallid.
  • Synonyms See whiten.
  • noun Any one of several white pierid butterflies, as the great southern white, Pontia motivate, the checkered white, P. protodice, the gray-veined white, Pieris napi, or the cabbage-butterfly, P. rapæ.
  • noun In milling, the trade-name of flour made from the whitest and finest part of the wheat and free from all the outer coats.
  • noun Same as bloom, 6 .
  • A dialectal form of thwite. Compare whittle from thwittle.
  • Of the color of pure snow or any powder of material transmitting all visible rays without sensible absorption; transmitting and so reflecting to the eye all the rays of the spectrum combined in the same proportions as in the impinging light, and thus, as seen in sunlight, conveying the same impression to the eye as sunlight of moderate intensity; not tinged or tinted with any of the proper colors or their compounds; snowy: the opposite of black or dark.
  • Pale; pallid; bloodless, as from fear or cowardice.
  • Free from spot or guilt; pure; clean; stainless.

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English, from Old English hwīt; see kweit- in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle English whit, hwit, from Old English hwīt, from Proto-Germanic *hwītaz (whence also West Frisian wyt, Dutch wit, German weiß, Norwegian hvit), from Proto-Indo-European *ḱweytos (“bright; shine”). Compare Lithuanian šviẽsti ("to gleam"), šviesa ("light"), Old Church Slavonic свѣтъ (světŭ, "light"), свѣтьлъ (světĭlŭ, "clear, bright"), Albanian vizull (" shine"), Avestan spaēta ("white"), Sanskrit श्वेत (śvetá, "white, bright").

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word white.

Examples

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.

  • I like it!

    October 25, 2008

  • Caucasoid race?

    October 25, 2008

  • A contest of running speed around the Caucasus mountains.

    October 25, 2008