livid
/ˈlɪvɪd/
Word Rarity
Rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 2.99 in modern English
9
Scrabble Score
5
Letters
2
Syllables
4
Unique Chars
Meaning
adj
Having a dark, bluish appearance.
Example Sentences
- "Jean Raynaud, cook, aged about twenty years, of a melancholy temperament, had his whole body covered with a purple livid colour, and a bubo under his left axilla; […] His lungs were covered with little livid ſpots, ſoft and pliant, without any hardneſs in their ſubſtance. The liver was larger and harder than ordinary, and was alſo full of livid purple ſpots; […]"
- "In [J. M. W.] Turner's distinctive work, colour is scarcely acknowledged unless under influences of sunshine. The sunshine is his treasure; his lividest gloom contains it; his greyest twilight regrets it, and remembers."
- "When all the surroundings were thus rendered as brilliant as possible, so that the corpse looked more livid and ghastly by comparison, I seated myself once more, and prepared to read the last message of the dead."
- "The house seemed unfamiliar in the dark stormy light; the red and purple glass of the front door made livid bruises on the linoleum; the green chenille curtain was like a veil of seaweed."
- "Ulcers having had their beginning during a Diſeaſe, or before it, growing livid, pale or dry, plainly indicate the proximity of Death, their livid or pale colour being not only the ſign of Cholerick, or Atrabiliary humours cauſing them, but alſo manifeſting an extinction of the natural heat."
- "15939 Cap somew[hat] umbon[ate] smooth livid pale, Lamel[læ] annexed flesh-colored, Stipes sold smooth somew[hat] bulbous. [Describing a species of fungus.]"
Etymology
Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *(s)leh₃y- Proto-Indo-European *(s)lih₃-wó-der. Proto-Italic *slīwēō Latin līveō Proto-Indo-European *dʰeh₁-der. Proto-Italic *-iðos Latin -idus Latin līvidusder. Middle French lividebor. Middle English livid English livid From Middle English livid, livide, from Old French livide, from Latin līvidus (“bluish, livid; envious”), from līveō (“be of a bluish color or livid; envy”), from Proto-Italic *sliwēō, from Proto-Indo-European *sliwo-, suffixed form of *(s)leh₃y- (“bluish”). See also Old English slā (“sloe”), Welsh lliw (“splendor, color”), Old Irish li, Lithuanian slyvas (“plum”), and Russian and Old Church Slavonic слива (sliva, “plum”).