Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. Frozen dew that forms a white coating on a surface. Also called white frost.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. White frost. See hoar, a., and frost.
Wiktionary
- n. Dew-drops which have undergone deposition and frozen into ice crystals to form a white deposit on an exposed surface, when the air is cold and moist.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. The white particles formed by the congelation of dew; white frost.
WordNet 3.0
- n. ice crystals forming a white deposit (especially on objects outside)
Examples
“I did have to look it up, not sure myself, but the explanation was simple really, frozen dew, but the word hoarfrost sounds much more mystical.”
“The Artemisia reef, what a fun thing…I love the word hoarfrost, too.”
“Having a hoarfrost is my absolute favorite thing about winter.”
“With the rarity of dew, that of hoarfrost which is nothing but frozen dew, may be associated; nor does hoarfrost often occur, because in Khorassan it rains in the winter too freely, particularly in all such places whose elevation is not sufficient to cause the formation of snow, and hence where other circumstances are favourable for hoarfrosts, _they are too much watered_ as it were, and seldom occur.”
Journals of Travels in Assam, Burma, Bhootan, Afghanistan and the Neighbouring Countries
“In that year, Dr Joseph Wright printed the fifth volume of the _English Dialect Dictionary_, showing that in the dialects of Scotland, Northumberland, Durham, and Yorkshire, the word for "hoarfrost" is not _rime_, but _rind_, with a derived adjective”
“Are those miniature street lamps beside hoarfrost coated trees?”
“This morning I woke up to fog filling the air and hoarfrost on the bare trees; looking at this beautiful site, I took a deep breath and a found a large smile upon my face.”
“Yet all sorts of hoarfrost may still come this way.”
“A few days last week we had some freezing fog early in the morning, which leads to hoarfrost.”
“The hoarfrost on the cars and the asphalt street, the century-old, dormant trees, are all as still as the night.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘hoarfrost’.
dimã©lion the definition seems scientific and recent but the word itself sounds archaic. that's my personal opinion, anyway. Nov 22, 2008
zuccaciyecioglu -giggle- Oct 2, 2008