shine
/ʃaɪn/
Word Rarity
Uncommon
Frequency: Zipf frequency 4.17 in modern English
8
Scrabble Score
5
Letters
1
Syllables
5
Unique Chars
Meaning
verb
To be eminent, conspicuous, or distinguished; to exhibit brilliant intellectual powers.
Intransitive verb
Example Sentences
- "The water shone pacifically; the sky, without a speck, was a benign immensity of unstained light; the very mist on the Essex marshes was like a gauzy and radiant fabric, hung from the wooded rises inland, and draping the low shores in diaphanous folds."
- "‘No. I only opened the door a foot and put my head in. The street lamps shine into that room. I could see him. He was all right. Sleeping like a great grampus. Poor, poor chap.’"
- "My nephew tried other sports before deciding on football, which he shone at right away, quickly becoming the star of his school team."
- "“[…] I was grateful to you for giving him a year’s schooling—where he shined at it—and for putting him as a clerk in your counting-house, where he shined still more.”"
- "It prompted an exchange of substitutions as Jermain Defoe replaced Palacios and Javier Hernandez came on for Berbatov, who had failed to shine against his former club."
- "I can take the heat, baby, best believe That's the moment I shine"
Etymology
From Middle English shinen, schinen (preterite schon, past participle schinen), from Old English sċīnan (“to shine, flash; be resplendent”; preterite sċān, past participle sċinen), from Proto-West Germanic *skīnan (“to shine”), from Proto-Germanic *skīnaną (“to shine”). Cognate with Dutch schijnen, German scheinen, Danish and Norwegian Bokmål skinne, Norwegian Nynorsk and Swedish skina, Faroese and Icelandic skína.
Origin
Word Breakdown
- Root: shinen, sċīnan, *skīnan, *skīnaną, schinen, scīn
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /ʃaɪn/
- British English: /ʃaɪn/