lightning

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Definitions (14)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary (5)

  1. noun An abrupt, discontinuous natural electric discharge in the atmosphere.
  2. noun The visible flash of light accompanying such a discharge.
  3. noun Informal A sudden, usually improbable stroke of fortune.
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Toggle Century definitions Century Dictionary (5)

Toggle GNU Webster definitions GNU Webster's 1913 (2)

Toggle WordNet definitions WordNet (2)

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Examples

  • It examines without fear, it walks without looking behind it; Cronos, the stupid, swallowed stones, Zeus breaks them with the lightning, and the lightning is the will. —  The George Sand-Gustave Flaubert Letters
  • For Vanyel calls the lightning, and smites him to the earth! —  Magic's Price
  • It was a land of thunderless lightning -- lightning from a clear sky, flashing here and there without warning or excuse. —  The Ivory Trail
  • In one of the early days of August a thunder-storm with torrents of rain detained him for longer than usual at Wimpole Street; the lightning was the lesser terror of the day, for in the evening entered Mr Barrett to his daughter with disagreeable questioning, and presently came the words — accompanied by a gaze of stern displeasure — “It appears that that man has spent the whole day with you.” —  Robert Browning
  • The beasts. —  The White Rose
 

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Lightning has been looked up 427 times, favorited 0 times, listed 27 times, and commented on once.

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Etymologies (3)

Toggle American Heritage etymologies American Heritage Dictionary (1)

  1. Middle English, gerund of lightnen, to illuminate, from lighten, from Old English līhtan; see leuk- in Indo-European roots.

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (2)

  1. Also in the first sense lightening, after the present form of the verb, but according to the orig. type lightning; from Middle English *lightning, liʒtnyng, illumination, verbal noun of lightnen, liʒtnen, illuminate: see lighten. Cf. lighting.
  2. Same as lightening.
 

Pronunciations
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/ˈlaɪtnɪŋ/
by American Heritage

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