Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. Any of numerous cultivated forms of a perennial plant (Dianthus caryophyllus) having showy, variously colored, usually double, often fragrant flowers with fringed petals.
- n. A flower of this plant. Also called clove pink.
- n. A pinkish tint once used in painting.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. Flesh-color; pink.
- n. In painting, the representation of flesh; the nude or undraped parts of a figure.
- n. In botany: The common name of the pink Dianthus Caryophyllus, a native of southern Europe, but cultivated from very ancient times for its fragrance and beauty. Under cultivation, in place of the original lilacpurple of the wild state, it has assumed a wide variety of tints, and numberless combinations of form and color. These varieties are grouped by florists into three classes, viz., bizarres, flakes, and picotees. Also called
carnation pink . - n. The Cæsalpinia pulcherrima, the Spanish carnation, a leguminous shrub with very showy flowers, often cultivated in tropical regions. Also formerly, by corruption, coronation.
- n. Incarnation.
Wiktionary
- n. botany A type of Eurasian plant widely cultivated for its flowers.
- n. The type of flower they bear, originally flesh-coloured, but since hybridizing found in a variety of colours.
- n. A rosy pink colour
- n. archaic The pinkish colors used in art to render human face and flesh
- n. Sometimes, a scarlet colour.
- adj. Of a rosy pink or red colour, like human flesh.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. The natural color of flesh; rosy pink.
- n. (Paint.) Those parts of a picture in which the human body or any part of it is represented in full color; the flesh tints.
- n. (Bot.) A species of Dianthus (Dianthus Caryophyllus) or pink, having very beautiful flowers of various colors, esp. white and usually a rich, spicy scent.
WordNet 3.0
- adj. pink or pinkish
- n. Eurasian plant with pink to purple-red spice-scented usually double flowers; widely cultivated in many varieties and many colors
- n. a pink or reddish-pink color
Etymologies
- Recorded since 1538, either (for its original color) from Medieval (=modern) French carnation ("person's color or complexion") (probably from Italian carnagione ("flesh color"), from Late Latin carnatio ("fleshiness"), from Latin caro ("flesh")) or a corruption of coronation (from coronare ("to crown"), from corona ("crown"); because of the flower's use in chaplets or from the toothed crown-like look of the petals). (Wiktionary)
- From obsolete French, flesh-colored, from Old French (from Old Italian carnagione, skin, complexion, from carne, flesh) or from Late Latin carnātiō, carnātiōn-, flesh, both from Latin carō, carn-; see sker-1 in Indo-European roots. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“Regarded as only suitable for sale in bodegas and grocery stores and primarily worn by pimply adolescents on middle-school dates, the carnation is a flower that is almost universally scorned.”
“Antichrist was just art house porn? what was he trying to say all women are are evil in carnation it in there nature.”
“I am a farmer although not in carnation and I like that the Port is helping to solve this because if the viaduct falls down and my produce can't get onto ships and out to markets, my farm stops being able to operate.”
O’Brien Grills Staffers About Tunnel Cost Overruns « PubliCola
“If you do not feel the same way, a white, yellow or stripped carnation is a sympathetic way to refuse.”
“Requiring even less heat than the carnation is the old-time and all-time favorite, the violet.”
“Normally, the carnation is a hardy perennial, but the garden kinds, or marguerites, are usually treated as annuals.”
“A wild-flower thrust into the same nosegay with the carnation was the more fragrant for the good company it had kept.”
“All red flowers, such as carnation and hibiscus are Arian.”
“What we know as a "carnation" is named for the fact that it is the color of (Caucasian) skin (carne-); it's therefore emphatically not a red *flower* - although the clovey scent can certainly be thought of as red.”
“But there is something amusing about him, something ‘forced,’” she detached the word, “like a green carnation, that is to say a thing that surprises me and docs not please me enormously, a thing it is surprising that anyone should have been able to create but which I feel would have been just as well uncreated.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘carnation’.
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Reds
crimson, blood, scarlet, rott, rojo, brick, fire engine, vermilion, carmine, burgundy, amaranth, alizarin and 115 more...
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CULI - wine-tasting adjectives
In this area of expertise nouns are frequently used as adjectives (almond, bacon, cider, diesel, fennel, fresh-cut hay, wool) or new adjectives are formed (appley, berrylike, citrusy, full-bodied, ...
acetic, acidic, aged, angular, appley, astringent, attractive, austere, berrylike, big, bitter, brawny and 511 more...
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Uncommon Colours
azure, myrtle, periwinkle, viridian, jade, emerald, lime, chartreuse, asparagus, celadon, harlequin, olive and 147 more...
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((Eye)) CBS = I See B.S.
Input limited to 30 seconds, so we needed to find cost-effective ways to become a part of your life. Uninvited houseguest technology: the link technique, thoughts as real estate. The full potential...
joy, dodge, ram, monster, coke, snuggle, gateway, ivory, life, subway, crunch, crest and 151 more...
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Flora
Flowers and plants have some of the most beautiful names.
These are often the common names, as opposed to the scientific or botanical names.daffodil, gardenia, tulip, snapdragon, violet, orchid, bleeding heart, daisy, lily, lilac, narcissus, rose and 278 more...
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spice
zest, clowe-gilofre, bespice, piquance, star anise, epice, eugenia aromaticum, macis, tanginess, pimenta dioica, fenugreek, Geri Halliwell and 34 more...
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♥
ambrosia, inamorata, gossamer, lily-white, hummingbird, roucoulement, poppy, daisy, calypso, lunula, lamb, dove and 1526 more...
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wanderstar's Words
superlative, mulish, mumps, catatonic, aquiline, clandestine, phantasmagoria, chryselephantine, microfiche, mutineer, reprobate, ruthless and 312 more...
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The O.U.P. Junior Dictionary Death Row
Another news story about words being removed from a dictionary before their time. See also the list of words added to the dictionary.
carol, cracker, holly, ivy, mistletoe, dwarf, elf, goblin, abbey, aisle, altar, bishop and 137 more...
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My Little Ponies 3
A list of My Little Pony names from the G3 collection. 2003-present
wysteria, rainbow dash, sweetberry, sunny daze, kimono, minty, pinkie pie, sparkleworks, star swirl, autumn skye, butterscotch, moondancer and 361 more...
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Flora
fenugreek, verbena, saxifrage, arbutus, calendula, nasturtium, lobelia, hellebore, rhododendron, philodendron, bellflower, heuchera and 449 more...
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Allographic Homophones
Words that can be pronounced identically but are spelled differently. I've started with unusual or extensive sets. In some of these sets, no one speaker would pronounce them all the same. I've trie...
air, are, ayr, ayre, e'er, ere, err, eyre, heir, apatite, appetite, picnic and 226 more...
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My Little Ponies
A list of My Little Pony names from the original (G1) collection. 1982-1992
cotton candy, butterscotch, blossom, blue belle, minty, snuzzle, seashell, bubbles, bow tie, applejack, sunbeam, medley and 352 more...
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Loxodont's list
circumambulate, atelectasis, paramount, therefore, apotropaic, facture, identity, dome, lecture, cannibal, catatonia, rite and 119 more...
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Stately Plants
The flowers and trees of states and nations.
camellia, forget-me-not, saguaro cactus, apple blossom, Calafornia poppy, Rocky Mountain, mountain laurel, peach blossom, American beauty rose, orange blossom, Cherokee rose, pua aloalo and 210 more...
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Chromonyms
These chromonyms are defined as colors in at least one dictionary (mostly MW3). (Actually there's one fake, for reasons I'll explain someday.) They are all one-word nouns such as "kelly", which can...
absinthe, acacia, acorn, alabaster, alesan, almond, aloma, amaranth, amber, amethyst, anemone, anil and 821 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for carnation.
seanmeade *awesome* etymology: from Italian incarnatino, which came from the Latin incarnato, something incarnate, made flesh, from in + caro, carn-, "flesh." It is related to carnation, etymologically the flesh-colored flower; incarnate, "in the flesh; made flesh"; and carnal, "pertaining to the body or its appetites." Mar 26, 2007