dusk
UK/dʌsk/
More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations
Northern England/dʊsk/
dusk adjective: tending to darkness or blackness; moderately dark or black; dusky.
Adjective
dusk (comparative dusker, superlative duskest)
- Tending to darkness or blackness; moderately dark or black; dusky.
- A pathless desert, dusk with horrid shades.1671, John Milton, “The First Book”, in Paradise Regain’d. A Poem. In IV Books. To which is Added, Samson Agonistes, London: […] J[ohn] M[acock] for John Starkey […], →OCLC
Noun
dusk (countable and uncountable, plural dusks)
- The time after the sun has set but when the sky is still lit by sunlight; the evening twilight period.
- Witnessing the dusk gives a feeling of solace.
- We caught a beautiful view of the dusk.
- Synonyms:
- evenfall
- A darkish colour.
- Whose dusk set off the whiteness of the skin.1700, [John] Dryden, “Palamon and Arcite”, in Fables Ancient and Modern; […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC
- The condition of being dusky; duskiness
Verb
dusk (third-person singular simple present dusks, present participle dusking, simple past and past participle dusked)
- To begin to lose light or whiteness; to grow dusk.
- I see the air benighted
And all the dusking dales,
And lamps in England lighted,1936, Alfred Edward Housman, More Poems, XXXIII, lines 25-27
- I see the air benighted
- To make dusk.
- After the sun is up, that shadow which dusketh the light of the Moone must needs be under the earth.1601, C[aius] Plinius Secundus [i.e., Pliny the Elder], “(please specify |book=I to XXXVII)”, in Philemon Holland, transl., The Historie of the World. Commonly Called, The Naturall Historie of C....
dusk meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu
dusk in Hindi
- period of time at the end of day when sun is below the horizon but before full onset of night
- गोधूलि godhūli
dusk in Tamil
- period of time at the end of day when sun is below the horizon but before full onset of night
- பட்டபோது paṭṭapōtu
dusk in Marathi
- dusk
- प्रदोष pradoṣ
dusk in Urdu
- dusk, sunset
- غروب ġurūb
More languagesFewer languages
- dusk in Telugu
- మునిమాపు వేళ munimāpu vēḷa, సాయం సంధ్య sāyaṁ sandhya
- dusk in Malayalam
- സായംസന്ധ്യ sāyaṁsandhya
- dusk in Kannada
- ಮುಂಗತ್ತಲು, ತಂಗುಬೆಳಕು, ಮೊಬ್ಬು, ಮುಸ್ಸಂಜೆ
- dusk in Punjabi
- ਸ਼ਾਮ śām, نماشاں namāśāṉ
- dusk in Sanskrit
- दोषस् doṣás
- dusk in Pashto
- نماښام nəmâx̌âm
- dusk in Tagalog
- takipsilim
- dusk in Arabic
- عِشَاء ʕišāʔ, غَسَق ḡasaq, يَغْسِق yaḡsiq, يَعْتِم yaʕtim
- dusk in Indonesian
- senja, sore
- dusk in Persian
- شامگاه šâmgâh
- dusk in Vietnamese
- chạng vạng
Examples of dusk in a sentence
- The relucent lake glittered, sparkling playfully, with the hues of dusk.
- At dusk an unusual calm befalls the wetlands.
- As dusk fell a storm got up.
Synonyms of dusk
Antonyms
Forms of dusk
| Adjective | |
|---|---|
| comparative | dusker |
| superlative | duskest |
| Noun | |
| plural | dusks |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | dusks |
| present participle | dusking |
| past participle | dusked |
| past | dusked |
Origin of dusk
From Middle English dosk, dusk(e) (“dusky”, adj.), from Old English dox (“dark, swarthy”), from Proto-Germanic *duskaz (“dark, smoky”), from Proto-Indo-European *dʰwes-, related to *dʰewh₂- (“smoke, mist, haze”). Cognate to Latin fuscus (“dark, dusky”), Sanskrit धूसर (dhūsara, “dust-colored”), Old Irish donn (“dark”). Related to dye, dust and dun (see these for more). Doublet of fuscous.
From Middle English dusken, from Old English doxian.
Words formed from dusk
Words that rhyme with dusk
Questions about dusk
- What does dusk mean?
- Dusk means tending to darkness or blackness; moderately dark or black; dusky.
- What is dusk in Hindi?
- Dusk in Hindi is गोधूलि (godhūli). See Dusk meaning in Hindi.
- What part of speech is dusk?
- Dusk can be an adjective, a noun or a verb.
- How do you pronounce dusk?
- Dusk is pronounced /dʌsk/ (UK).
Words near dusk in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: dusk (page history and authors); प्रदोष (Marathi) (page history and authors); غروب (Urdu) (page history and authors); dusk (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); نماشاں (Punjabi) (page history and authors); نماښام (Pashto) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
Last updated:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-dusk.ogg.
Cite this entry: “dusk.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/dusk. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.