Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun A rainbowlike display of colors resulting from refraction of sunlight through a spray of water.
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun An iris formed by the refraction of light on the spray of cataracts, or on any rising vapor.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun A rainbow; an iris.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun A bow or arc of prismatic colors like a
rainbow , caused byrefraction through aspray ofwater from acataract ,waterfall ,fountain , etc., rather than through droplets of rain.
Etymologies
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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Below arose the mist, on which was painted a dazzling sunbow with two concentric shadows, -- one, almost as perfect as the original brightness; and the other, drawn faintly round the broken edge of the cloud.
Elson Grammar School Literature v4 William H. Elson
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As a sunbow laughs and is lost on the waves that range220
A Nympholept 1917
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After a pause, the WITCH OF THE ALPS rises beneath the arch of the sunbow of the torrent.
Act II. Scene II 1909
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As a sunbow laughs and is lost on the waves that range
Astrophel and Other Poems Taken from The Collected Poetical Works of Algernon Charles Swinburne, Vol. VI Algernon Charles Swinburne 1873
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A bright sunbow stood over the torrent, which, seen from below, has the appearance of a luminous white arch bending from rock to rock.
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After a pause, the_ WITCH OF THE ALPS _rises beneath the arch of the sunbow of the torrent.
The Works of Lord Byron. Vol. 4 George Gordon Byron Byron 1806
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When I take up my pen to record the impressions of the day, I sometimes turn within myself, and wonder how it is possible that amid the strife of feelings not all subdued, and the desponding of the heart, the mind should still retain its faculties unobscured, and the imagination all its vivacity and its susceptibility to pleasure, -- like the beautiful sunbow I saw at the Falls of Terni, bending so bright and so calm over the verge of the abyss which toiled and raged below.
qms commented on the word sunbow
There’s nonsense and much mumbo-jumbo
In this, our linguistical gumbo:
In absence of rain,
The pedants explain,
You must call a rainbow a sunbow.
April 18, 2018