purpureal
Syllables: pur·pu·re·al/pɜːˈpjʊə.ɹɪ.əl/US/pɝˈp(j)ʊ.ɹi.əl/
purpureal adjective: of a purple colour.
Adjective
purpureal (comparative more purpureal, superlative most purpureal)
- Of a purple colour.
- [G]liding thro' his daughter's honour'd ſhades, / The ſmooth Penéus from his glaſſy flood / Reflects purpureal Tempe's pleaſant ſcene?1744, [Mark Akenside], “Book the First”, in The Pleasures of Imagination. A Poem. In Three Books, London: […] R[obert] Dodsley […], →OCLC, page 16, lines 296–298
- [T]he fair star / That gems the glittering coronet of morn, / Sheds not a light so mild, so powerful, / As that which, bursting from the Fairy's form, / Spread a purpureal halo round the scene, / Yet with an undulating motion, / Swayed to her outline gracefully.1813, Percy Bysshe Shelley, “Canto I”, in Queen Mab; […], London: […] P. B. Shelley, […], →OCLC, page 6
- Synonyms:
- purple, purpuraceous, purpurate, purpure, purpurean, purpureous, purpurine
Examples of purpureal in a sentence
- Of all that is most beauteous—imaged there / In happier beauty; more pellucid streams, / An ampler ether, a diviner air, / And fields invested with purpureal gleams; [...]1815, William Wordsworth, “[Poems Founded on the Affections.] Laodamia.”, in Poems […], volume I, London: […] Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme...
- But not ere him who summoneth / I first have seen, enwound / With glooming robes purpureal, cypress-crowned; [...]1893, Francis Thompson, “The Hound of Heaven”, in The Works of Francis Thompson, volume I (Poems), New York, N.Y.: Charles Scribner’s Sons...
- Above the altar-lace / he mounted a triptych of the Assumption / with coarse, purpureal clouds, a prescient Madonna / drawn from Leonardo's "Our Lady of the Rocks."1973, Derek Walcott, “[Homage to Gregorias] Chapter 10”, in Another Life, New York, N.Y.: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, →ISBN, page 63:
Synonyms of purpureal
- purple
- purpureous
- purpuraceous
- purpurate
- purpure
- purpurean
- purpurine
Forms of purpureal
| comparative | more purpureal |
|---|---|
| superlative | most purpureal |
Origin of purpureal
From Latin purpureus (“purple, violet; brown, reddish; clothed in purple; (figurative) brilliant, shining; beautiful”) + English -al (suffix meaning ‘of or pertaining to’ forming adjectives). Purpureus is either derived: * from purpura (“the colour purple; purple-fish (Hexaplex trunculus)”) (from Ancient Greek πορφῠ́ρᾱ (porphŭ́rā, “purple-fish; purple dye obtained from it; purple-dyed cloth; purple stripe or other adornment of a garment”), from πορφύρω (porphúrō, “to redden”)) + -eus (suffix forming adjectives from nouns); or * from Ancient Greek πορφύρεος (porphúreos, “of a purple colour”), from πορφῠ́ρᾱ (porphŭ́rā) (see above) + -εος (-eos).
Questions about purpureal
- What does purpureal mean?
- Purpureal means of a purple colour.
- How do you use purpureal in a sentence?
- Of all that is most beauteous—imaged there / In happier beauty; more pellucid streams, / An ampler ether, a diviner air, / And fields invested with purpureal gleams; [...]
- What part of speech is purpureal?
- Purpureal is an adjective.
- How do you pronounce purpureal?
- Purpureal is pronounced /pɜːˈpjʊə.ɹɪ.əl/ (UK).
Words near purpureal in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: purpureal (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.
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Cite this entry: “purpureal.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/purpureal. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.