sky
/skaɪ/
Word Rarity
Uncommon
Frequency: Zipf frequency 4.72 in modern English
10
Scrabble Score
3
Letters
1
Syllables
3
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
The atmosphere above a given point, especially as visible from the surface of the Earth as the place where the sun, moon, stars, and clouds are seen.
noun
With a descriptive word: the part of the sky which can be seen from a specific place or at a specific time; its climate, condition, etc.
noun
Usually preceded by the: the abode of God or the gods, angels, the souls of deceased people, etc.; heaven; also, powers emanating from heaven.
Archaic; Literary
noun
The set of all lightlike lines (or directions) passing through a given point in space-time.
Example Sentences
- "That year, a meteor fell from the sky."
- "For beſides the groues, / The skyes, the fountaines, euery region neare / Seeme all one mutuall cry. I neuer heard / So muſicall a diſcord, ſuch ſweete thunder."
- "His wearie ghoſt aſſoyld from fleſhly band, / Did not as others wont, directly fly / Vnto her reſt in Plutoes grieſly land, / Ne into ayre did vaniſh preſently, / Ne chaunged was into a ſtarre in sky: […]"
- "[I]f you doe not all ſhew like guilt twoo pences to mee, and I in the cleere skie of Fame, ore-ſhine you as much as the full moone doth the cindars of the element, (which ſhew like pinnes heads to her) beleeue not the worde of the noble: […]"
- "[A] Nobler Sir, ne're liu'd / 'Twixt sky and ground."
- "I went with some of my relations to Court, to shew them his Maᵗⁱᵉˢ cabinet and closset of rarities; […] Here I saw […] amongst the clocks, one that shew'd the rising and setting of the Sun in yᵉ Zodiaq, the Sunn represented by a face and raies of gold, upon an azure skie, observing yᵉ diurnal and annual motion, rising and setting behind a landscape of hills, the work of our famous Fromantel; and severall other rarities."
Etymology
The noun is derived from Middle English sky (“sky; cloud; mist”), also spelled ski, skie, [and other forms], from Old Norse ský (“cloud”), from Proto-Germanic *skiwją (“cloud; sky”), from *skiwô (“cloud; cloud cover, haze; sky”) (whence Old English sċēo (“cloud”) and Middle English skew (“air; sky; (rare) cloud”)), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)kewH- (“to cover; to conceal, hide”). Partly displaced Old English heofon, which survives in the reflex heaven, still sometimes used in the sense of sky, but usually in high or poetic register. The verb is derived from the noun. Cognates The English word is cognate with Old English scēo (“cloud”), Old Saxon scio, skio, skeo (“light cloud cover”), Danish, Swedish and Norwegian Bokmål sky (“cloud”), Old Irish ceo (“mist, fog”), Irish ceo (“mist, fog”). It is also related to Old English scūa (“shadow, darkness”), Latin obscūrus (“dark, shadowy”), Sanskrit स्कुनाति (skunāti, “he covers”). See also hide, hose, house, hut, shoe.
Origin
Word Breakdown
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /skaɪ/
- British English: /skaɪ/
Usage
Subject
Wiktionary places this term in Physics.