Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- adjective Composed of silver.
- adjective Resembling silver; silvery.
from The Century Dictionary.
- Made of or resembling silver; having any characteristic of or analogy to silver: as, “speech is silvern, silence is golden.”
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- adjective Archaic. Made of silver.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- adjective archaic
Made ofsilver .
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- adjective resembling or reminiscent of silver
- adjective having the white lustrous sheen of silver
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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One of the few rational things I have met with, Eleanor, in the works of your very objectionable pet Mr. Carlyle -- though indeed his style is too intolerable to have allowed me to read much -- is the remark that 'speech is silver' -- 'silvern' he calls it, pedantically -- 'while silence is golden.'"
Alton Locke, Tailor and Poet An Autobiography Charles Kingsley 1847
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In the night, the sea colored, I had a split silvern mermaid tail beneath the sea blue in waves' crests and in foam.
Susanne Jorn greenintegerblog 2008
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She said, It hath reached me, O auspicious King that quoth the slave-girl, “Bring us meat and drink for three dinars, furthermore a piece of silk, the size of a curtain, and bring golden and silvern thread and sewing silk of seven colours.”
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She was clad in brocades befitting Kings; her breasts were like twin pomegranates, a woven zone set with all kinds of jewels tightly clasped her waist which expanded below into jutting hips; and her hinder cheeks stood out as a mound of crystal185 supporting a silvern shaft.
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Round the pavilion ran a channel of water, turning a Persian wheel317 whose buckets 318 were silvern covered with brocade.
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Then Ibrahim fared forward and found all as it had been described by the Gobbo: he also saw the garden-gate open, and in the porch a couch of ivory, whereon sat a hump backed man of pleasant presence, clad in gold-laced clothes and hending in hand a silvern mace plated with gold.
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At the upper end rose a throne of gold whereon sat a damsel, whose face was like the moon, arrayed in royal raiment and beautified as she were a bride on the night of her displaying; and at the foot of the throne was a table of forty trays spread with golden and silvern dishes full of dainty viands.
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Now it fortuned, by the ordinance of Destiny and fore-ordained Fate, that the King had two stallions, own brothers,551 such as the Chosroe Kings might sigh in vain to possess themselves of one of them; they were called Sábik and Láhik552 and one of them was pure silvern white while the other was black as the darksome night.
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A marvellous scent rose from her silvern raiment as she moved, and beauty was wafted from her eyes.
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For it is only by being convinced of the truth and importance of our thoughts that there arises in us the inspiration necessary for the inexhaustible patience to discover the clearest, finest, and most powerful expression for them; just as one puts holy relics or priceless works of art in silvern or golden receptacles.
yarb commented on the word silvern
He agreed grimly: "Yes, it's been a day," and looked over his shoulder at the quiet silvern garden, and shivered.
- Rebecca West, The Judge
September 12, 2009
sionnach commented on the word silvern
Maybe he saw a wyvern in the sylvern garden.
September 12, 2009