amber

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California's Fossil Fuels Brewing Company brews a beer derived from yeast found in Burmese amber that dates from 25 to 45 million years ago.

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Definitions (34)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary (4)

  1. noun A hard translucent yellow, orange, or brownish-yellow fossil resin, used for making jewelry and other ornamental objects.
  2. noun A brownish yellow.
  3. adjective Having the color of amber; brownish-yellow.
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Examples (50)

  • Chapter Nine Below us the ball of the planet was a sphere of Sirenean amber, not the honey-amber or the butter-amber of Terra, but ocher very lightly tinged with green. —  Norton, Andre - Uncharted Stars (v1.0) (html).html
  • Silver jewelry studded with precious materials such as amber, turquoise, and Larimer are beautiful and affordable to people no matter the size of their budget.
  • What to buy: Rum, coffee, vanilla, art and amber are all good buys. —  canada.com Top Stories
  • The usually ascetic note is made sensual here by orris and amber, and the hints of sweet spice, which linger long into the drydown, add a vaguely gourmand undertone to the perfume ... —  Perfume-Smellin' Things Perfume Blog
  • California's Fossil Fuels Brewing Company brews a beer derived from yeast found in Burmese amber that dates from 25 to 45 million years ago. —  Alcohol and Drugs History Society
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Etymologies (3)

Toggle American Heritage etymologies American Heritage Dictionary (1)

  1. Middle English ambre, from Old French, from Medieval Latin ambra, ambar, from Arabic 'anbar, ambergris, amber.

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (2)

  1. Not used in Middle English except in Middle Latin form ambra; from Anglo-Saxon amber, ambær, ambur, ombar, ombor, orig. with a long vowel, āmber, (1) a vessel (with one handle ?), a pail, bucket, pitcher, urn; (2) a liquid measure; (3) a dry measure of four bushels (= Old Saxon ēmbar, ēmber, ēmmar = Old Dutch eemer, Dutch emmer = Old High German einbar, einpar, eimbar, eimpar, Middle High German einber, eimber, German eimer, a pail, a bucket — orig. a vessel with one handle ?); as if from ān (= Old Saxon ēn = Dutch een = German ein, from Old High German ein), one, + -ber, from beran, English bear; cf. Old High German zwibar, zubar, Middle High German zuber, zober, German zuber, a tub (with two handles), from Old High German zwi- (= Anglo-Saxon twi-), two, + -bar = Anglo-Saxon -ber. But as the Anglo-Saxon and other forms are glossed by the various Latin names amphora, lagena, urceus, cadus, batus, situla, hydria, etc., the sense ‘one-handled’ does not seem to be original, and the spelling may have been corrupted to suit the popular etymology, the real source being then L. amphora, a two-handled vessel: see amphora. The Old High German ein-bar, so developed as ‘one-handled,’ would naturally be followed by zwi-bar, ‘two-handled.’
  2. from Middle English amber, aumber, ambyr, aumbyr, awmyr, ambre, aumbre, from Old French ambre, French ambre = Provencal ambra = Spanish Portuguese ambar, Portuguese also ambre, = Italian ambra = Dutch amber = Swedish Danish ambra = German amber, ambra = Russian ambra = Middle Latin ambra, also ambre, ambrum, amber, ambar, from Arabic 'anbar, ambergris — the orig. sense, the name being extended in Europe to the partly similar resin amber, 2.
 

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/ˈæmbər/
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