ultramarine
/ˌəltɹəməˈɹin/
Word Rarity
Very rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 2.24 in modern English
13
Scrabble Score
11
Letters
4
Syllables
9
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
In full ultramarine blue: a brilliant blue pigment traditionally made from ground-up lapis lazuli, and now usually either extracted from mineral deposits or made synthetically.
Countable; Uncountable
Example Sentences
- "[I]n England we ſhall never be taught to look upon the annihilation of our trade, the ruin of our credit, the defeat of our armies, and the loſs of our ultramarine dominions (whatever the author may think of them), to be the high road to proſperity and greatneſs."
- "The atmosphere beneath is languorous, and is so tinged with azure that what artists call the middle distance partakes also of that hue, while the horizon beyond is of the deepest ultramarine."
Etymology
Borrowed from Medieval Latin ultrāmarīnus, from Latin ultrā (“beyond”) + marīnus (“of or relating to the sea, marine”). By surface analysis, ultra + marine. Noun sense 1 (“pigment”) refers to the fact that lapis lazuli was obtained from foreign countries and hence “beyond the sea”.
Origin
- Source language: Latin
Word Breakdown
- Root: *h₂el-, ultrāmarīnus, ultrā
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /ˌəltɹəməˈɹin/
- British English: /ˌʌltɹəməˈɹiːn/