Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Flowing with sweetness or honey.
- adj. Smooth and sweet: "polite and cordial, with a mellifluous, well-educated voice” ( H.W. Crocker III).
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- Flowing or dropping like honey; hence, sweetly or smoothly flowing, especially in sound.
Wiktionary
- adj. Flowing like honey.
- adj. Sweet and smooth; generally used of a person's voice, tone or writing style.
GNU Webster's 1913
- adj. Flowing as with honey; smooth; flowing sweetly or smoothly.
WordNet 3.0
- adj. pleasing to the ear
Etymologies
- Middle English, from Late Latin mellifluus : Latin mel, mell-, honey; see melit- in Indo-European roots + Latin -fluus, flowing; see bhleu- in Indo-European roots. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“Then again, he did use the word "mellifluous" just for flare -- maybe saying, "amen" is just some literary device we don't understand yet ...”
“I was pleased to see the word "mellifluous" in today's post, especially as your use of it was so apt.”
“Then there were words which were beautiful to hear, which had a rich sound -- words like "mellifluous" and "brocade" and "Cleopatra.”
“Smokey Robinson coined the term "quiet storm" to describe a certain kind of mellifluous R&B back in the mid-70s, and the four-times-platinum Diamond Life, which won the BRIT Award for Best Album in 1985, and its attendant four singles, helped give that gently turbulent music a wide, even international audience.”
“Senator John McCain, who has not known as a mellifluous orator, is already playing the political game of lowering expectations for his acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention in Minneapolis next month – particularly since Senator Barack Obama will deliver his speech before the Democrats at the Denver Broncos’ football stadium.”
McCain on His Convention Speech - The Caucus Blog - NYTimes.com
“The voice on the Route-8 bus pronounces the names of each bus stop in perfect, mellifluous native Hawaiian: "Kuhio and Lili'uokalani," the recording says as the bus approaches a stop on the way to Waikiki Beach.”
The Wall Street Journal: How to Pronounce Lili'uokalani? Ask Marvin Nogelmeier
“Marian Evans with her long, weird, dreamy face; Lewes, with his big brow and keen thoughtful eyes; Browning, pale and spruce, his eye like a skipper's cocked-up at the weather; Peacock, with his round, mellifluous speech of the old Greeks; David Gray, great-eyed and beautiful, like Shelley’s ghost; Lord Houghton, with his warm worldly smile and easy-fitting enthusiasm.”
The Idler Magazine, Vol III. May 1893 An Illustrated Monthly
“Seek ye then, fair daughters, the possession of that inward grace, whose essence shall permeate and vitalize the affections, adorn the countenance, make mellifluous the voice, and impart a hallowed beauty even to your motions.”
“The leader of the LDK, the forever silk scarfed and mellifluous Dr. Ibrahim Rugova, compared himself openly and blushlessly to Vaclav Havel and the Kosovar struggle to the Velvet Revolution.”
“To its musical murmur may be traced the mellifluous cadences of the statesman's voice employed so effectually in his appeals to Labour and the Paris Conference.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘mellifluous’.
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Test Prep or Just for fun
Building a list for standardized test prep or just for learning some new words! Please add any words that you feel are important for the SAT/GRE/GMAT etc...
throng, morass, parley, facile, kismet, strife, jetsam, carrion, annex, harbinger, vestige, surreptitious and 575 more...
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501
Classic
mete, ire, bane, bilk, boor, elan, ado, toil, onus, aberration, abstruse, anomaly and 401 more...
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501
Classic
aberration, abstruse, anomaly, assiduous, august, banal, boisterous, dulcet, epitome, impudent, insolent, mellifluous and 401 more...
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501
Classic
aberration, abstruse, anomaly, assiduous, august, banal, boisterous, dulcet, epitome, impudent, insolent, mellifluous and 401 more...
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501
Classic
bane, bilk, boor, elan, ado, toil, onus, aberration, abstruse, anomaly, assiduous, august and 401 more...
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Used
halcyon, ineluctable, inspissated, incarnadine, askance, demur, saltation, requisite, effusive, specious, liminality, indomitable and 114 more...
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Philosophic , etymology
every major discipline has uniquely developed esoteric nomenclature to facilitate interdisciplinary dissemination
quale , qualia, elegy, tacet, lexicon, annunciate, caste, eros, contrive, purlicue, irony, venacular, dilapidate and 567 more...
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Recently Loved Words
Valentine's Day is coming up, so here's a list of words that have been "loved" here on Wordnik (our favorite site with a heart as part of its logo).
howl, lichenous, uncomplicated, siliceous, clatter, hubris, dervish, articulated, acerbic, Recently Loved Words, mellifluous, anomaly and 45 more...
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Remember Not To Forget
Sephardic, Umwelt, amphiboly, untrammeled, sequela, pandiculation, tensegrity, syncretism, pugilism, shemagh, disquisition, perspicacity and 61 more...
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big book gre
abase, abbess, abbey, abbot, abdicate, abdomen, abdominal, abduction, abed, aberration, abet, abeyance and 6689 more...
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Vocab_TC60Q_txtbook
most vocab in the textbook Page till end chapter 2.
moribund, unflagging, defunct, sated, inveigling, opining, needling, fulminating, lauding, vassals, serfs, minions and 86 more...
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gre2
aberrant, aberration, aboveboard, abrasive, abstemious, acme, admonish, affable, affluent, alacrity, allegory, alleviate and 1824 more...
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Words For Novel
viridity, effigy, paragon, congested, acrid, lilting, clandestine, plethora, accolade, sardonic, naïve, reckoning and 285 more...
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All The Words
I enjoy collecting words, for I have no fear of them ever running out.
anacoluthon, defenestration, hypnopomp, hypnagogue, idioglossia, panopticon, tatterdemalion, abalone, caltrop, miasma, paroxysm, smalt and 475 more...
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my GRE words
pedant, wizened, histrionic, logorrhea, frenetic, approbation, quibble, knell, acclivity, droog, prevarication, aplomb and 182 more...
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Faves
nepenthe, cupidity, anodyne, obdurate, doleful, obsolescent, quale, piquant, velleity, inchoate, disport, facile and 366 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for mellifluous.
dailyword I had this word yesterday on my Word Of The Day app on my Nook Color. Jun 5, 2012
michaelt42 Mellifluous is an example of a word the fantasy of which has overtaken the reality. One imagines honeycomb as it is taken from the hive, dripping with the clear lightly coloured fluid and all the Marie Antoinette stuff, but she ain't going to recover refined honey, still less go out there with her protective suit and visor to harvest the comb from the hive. The fantasy is of a land overflowing with milk and honey, the reality is that these benefits have to be won by the labour of the beekeeper and the milkmaid. Little wonder that mellifluous is generally associated with the quality of the sound of music or of words, spoken or sung. Dec 7, 2011
Adithya Raghunathan (too) often used in Carnatic music album notes.... Nov 22, 2011
yarb In the parlance of our times, synaesthetic much?
(Actually I find that description every bit as nauseating as the word, so... nice one!) Nov 19, 2009
PossibleUnderscore I imagine this word to be undulating and waving gently, streaked a strange combination of light blue and light brown, surrounded by miniscule green and yellow squares. Nov 19, 2009
Jubjub This word doesn't work. It never has. It's too ... too what? Too sweet? Too obvious? Too forced? Too tongue-tying? And the imagery it evokes is sticky, slow, and viscous-- sort of the opposite of what it wants to do.
Nov 14, 2009
mcgelligot I found a reference to mellifluous in regard to the flow of the written word at Frog Princeps it is a blog:
"The book rewards the reader with a mellifluous flow of language that will startle, intrigue and bewitch the reader." Nov 14, 2009
etaoinsrdlu (smellifluous: Pleasing to the nose?) Jan 17, 2009
chained_bear It is indeed.
I always start singing the truffula song from The Lorax. However the hell you spell truffula... Dec 3, 2008
andreatheawesome I always imagine the visual image of the word mellifluous to be a soft brown/chocolate wavy line, flowing genltly and quietly in/on a cream colored space.
Mellifluous is a mellifluous word. Dec 3, 2008
savingrace mellifluous- i first became familiar with this word while reading june jordan. she used it eloquently, with great image and soul. she described a biblical land overflowing with milk and honey. the word is certainly a graceful and refreshing throwback to a chimerical land laced with sweet leche y miel. Nov 22, 2008
nlaroche Similar in pattern, yes, I think is what I meant to imply by my question... I love the beauty of mellifluous and "picturesque" just doesn't compare. Perhaps I'm still on a hunt. Sep 25, 2008
mollusque Similar in pattern of derivation? Probably not. Similar in meaning, yes, but finding a word that means only "pleasing to the eye" and hasn't been broadened to include other senses (in both senses) is tough.
How about beauteous or picturesque? Sep 24, 2008
vanishedone Photogenic? Sep 24, 2008
gangerh Eye candy? Sep 24, 2008
nlaroche Is there a visual equivalent to this word? I'd love to know it. Sep 24, 2008
chicie honey should be included in the definition.
this is an amazing word, almost an onomatopoeia. Jul 21, 2008
yarb I am not as mellifluous as Sir John Betjeman.
- Peter Reading, Opinions of the Press, from Fiction, 1979 Jun 26, 2008
prasadkdr Mellifluous means pleasing to the ear Apr 28, 2008
frindley See also grandiloquent/grandiloquence.
Mellifluous grandiloquence is something else altogether! Mar 16, 2008
chesler This was a favorite of the greatest orator I ever had the honor to learn from, Richard Sodikow, Speech & Debate Coach, The Bronx HS of Science. When he said it, he demonstrated just how well it flowed like honey past his lips. Mar 1, 2008
bilby Honey doesn't flow much and creamed honey doesn't flow at all. Dec 18, 2007
ravages smooth, sweet, feminine.
describing a language?
of greek origin(?) Dec 18, 2007
artistx Doesn't it just flow! Great word Apr 19, 2007
seanmeade mellifluous is such a great sounding word! ;-) Mar 26, 2007
valse Wonderful etymology: "flowing with honey." The word can be used in that literal sense, but the "metaphorical" sense (e.g. to describe someone's voice or movement) just works really nicely. Jan 14, 2007