saffron
Part of speech: noun
adj
verb
Morphological type: simple
Etymology: Etymology tree
Aramaic צפרder.
Arabic زَعْفَرَان (zaʕfarān)bor.
Medieval Latin safranumbor.
Old French safranbor.
Middle English saffron
English saffron
Inherited from Middle English saffron, borrowed from Old French safran, borrowed from Medieval Latin safranum, borrowed from Arabic زَعْفَرَان (zaʕfarān), from Aramaic צפר.
Inflected forms:
form: saffrons
pos: noun
tags: plural
form: saffrons
pos: verb
tags: present
singular
third-person
form: saffroning
pos: verb
tags: participle
present
form: saffroned
pos: verb
tags: participle
past
form: saffroned
pos: verb
tags: past
Senses:
gloss: A plant of species Crocus sativus, a crocus.
pos: noun
tags: countable
uncountable
examples: Thy plants are an orchard of pomegranates, with pleasant fruits; camphire, with spikenard, spikenard and saffron […]
2009, D. H. Sanaeinejad, S. N. Hosseini, Regression Models for Saffron Yields in Iran, Daoliang Li, Chunjiang Zhao (editors), Computer and Computing Technologies in Agriculture II, Volume 1, page 510,
Usually the maximum temperature for October, November and December in the southern parts of Khorassan–the main saffron growing area of the Iran-does not exceed 20°C, while the minimum temperature reaches 0°C.
gloss: A spice (seasoning) and colouring agent made from the stigma and part of the style of the plant, sometimes or formerly also used as a dye and insect repellent.
pos: noun
tags: countable
uncountable
examples: I must have saffron to colour the warden pies […]
1658, Thomas Muffet, The Theatre of Insects, [1634, Insectorum sive Minimorum Animalium Theatrum], quoted in 2008, Anna Suranyi, The Genius of the English Nation: Travel Writing and National Identity in Early Modern England, page 117-118,
The Irish and Ireland people (who are frequently troubled with lice, and such as will fly, as they say, in summer) anoint their shirts with saffron, and to very good purpose, to drive away the lice, but after six months they wash their shirts again, putting fresh saffron into the lye.
Saffron is not included in American and British pharmacopoeias, but some Indian medical formulae still include it.
According to ancient legend, a Greek girl, partaking of saffron for an entire week, could not resist a lover.
Saffron is the stigma of the crocus flower, which is harvested by hand, dried, and sold either in strands or ground to powder.[…]Of all the medieval spices, saffron was the most expensive, which is not surprising given that 70,000 flowers only yield one pound of dried stigmas. In the European cookbooks of the late Middle Ages, nearly all of which which reflect refined upper-class dining, saffron is ubiquitous.
Saffron is often called the “golden spice.”
gloss: An orange-yellow colour, the colour of a lion's pelt.
pos: noun
tags: countable
uncountable
examples: […] The stately Ram
Shone thro’ the Mead, in native Purple clad,
Or milder Saffron […]
[…] the girls locked up Echo Lodge again and went away in the perfect half hour that follows the rose and saffron of a winter sunset.
These colours might have been expressly designed—by dissonance as much as harmony—for juxtaposition against those pouring down in brilliant rays of light from the Tiepolo; subtle yet penetrating pinks and greys, light blue turning almost to lavender, rich saffrons and cinnamons melting into bronze and gold.
The classical shades of Antiquity were the most prevalent, but along with the Venetian reds and Egyptian blues, the saffrons and ochres and indigos, were more delicate hues: of pink and cream and lilac, like shells littered upon the shore.
On another occasion, H-pop singer Kanhiya Mittal sang a duet with a BJP lawmaker whose lyrics read “the saffron is getting deeper”, a reference to the colour of Hinduism and the BJP's own party colours, […]
gloss: Having an orange-yellow colour.
pos: adj
examples: For ioyfull thoughts, vse funerall deedes
1794, Ann Radcliffe, The Mysteries of Udolpho, London: G.G. & J. Robinson, Volume 1, Chapter 9, p. 256,
The sun was now set; but, under the dark branches of the almond trees, was seen the saffron glow of the west, spreading beyond the twilight of middle air.
[…] it was half-past four, and the gray day was dying gloriously, its western clouds all broken into narrowing purple strata before a wide-spreading saffron clearness […]
The jacket was brown but had turned saffron where it had been soaked by Lal’s sweat.
gloss: Associated with Hinduism, Hindus or Hindu nationalism.
pos: adj
examples: Saffron voters will certainly respond to the Sena chief’s call to support this alliance.
That is when he decided it was time to turn saffron, though it took him another ten years to formally join the BJP in 2014.
gloss: To add saffron to (a food), for taste, colour etc.
pos: verb
examples: saffroned water, saffroned rice
Saffrond wyne bryngeth mirthe, and taketh away Melancholines […]
Well-saffroned was that barley-soup!
gloss: To give a saffron colour to (something).
pos: verb
examples: My dreadful thoughts been drawen vpon my face,
In blotted lines with ages iron pen,
The lothlie morpheu saffroned the place,
Where beuties damaske daz’d the eies of men.
Or like the twifold-twynned Geminy,
In their star-gilded gyrdle strongly tyed,
Chayn’d by their saffrond tresses in the sky,
Standing to guard the sun-coche in his pride.
We accept the perfect stillness of the ground,
And the vision of a sunset-saffroned sea.
gloss: To give a saffron colour to (something).
pos: verb
examples: The other part Northern, & ful of mountaines, a very rude and homely kinde of people doth inhabite, which are called the redshankes or wilde Scottes. They be clothed with a mantel and shyrte saffroned, after the Irishe manner, going bare legged to the knée.
Thee next day foloing lustring Aurora lay shymring,
Her saffrond mattresse leauing to her bedfelo Tithon.
1638, uncredited translator, Historie Naturall and Experimentall, of Life and Death by Francis Bacon, London: William Lee and Humphrey Mosley, p. 244,
The same Irish, use to weare Saffroned Linnen, and Shirts; Which though it were, at first, devised to prevent Vermine, yet, howsoever, I take it, to be very usefull for Lengthening of Life […]
gloss: To give a saffron colour to (something).
pos: verb
examples: His horse was harnished with leaden chaines, hauing the out-side guilt, or at least saffrond in stead of guilt, to decypher a holie or golden pretence of a couetous purpose […]
And like vile stones lying in saffrond tinne,
Or warts, or wheales, it hangs upon her skinne.
gloss: To embellish.
pos: verb
tags: figuratively
examples: Saffroning the rest of the account are several other regionalisms: agin for against, hit for the expletive it, knowed as a preterite, and no use to say not bin' (a fascinating doubling of the negative).
He saffrons his speech with Latin which he knows all by rote.
The Nun's Priest's rhetorical devices, too numerous to catalogue exhaustively, are of two kinds: first, the heroic-historical, beginning with the setting of the occasion in a time sequence that starts with the Creation, saffroning the high points with apostrophes and epic similes, and culminating with a chase in which Chauntecleer's fall proves to have the "cosmic reverberations" required by epic standards […]
Related words: safflower
safranine
autumn crocus
crocein
crocoite
crocus
curcuma
kumkum
colchicum
crocus bag
crocus sack
turmeric
Derived words: African saffron
American saffron
bastard saffron
Cape saffron
cobra saffron
dyer's saffron
ensaffroned
false saffron
Indian saffron
iron saffron
meadow saffron
meadow-saffron
Persian saffron
saffron-billed sparrow
saffron buckwheat
saffron cod
saffron-cowled blackbird
saffron crocus
saffron finch
saffron-headed parrot
saffronisation
saffronization
saffronize
saffronlike
saffron milkcap
saffron milk cap
saffron plum
saffron shadow dancer
saffron siskin
saffron spike
saffron terror
saffron toucanet
saffron tree
Saffron Walden
saffron wood
saffronwood
saffrony
saffron yellow
sheep saffron
thistle saffron
Translations:
lang: Albanian
word: shafran
lang: Albanian
word: krrokull
lang: Arabic
word: زَعْفَرَان
roman: zaʕfarān
lang: Arabic
word: زعفران
roman: zaʕfarān
lang: Arabic
word: زعفران
roman: zaʕfarān
lang: Arabic
word: زعفران
roman: zaʕfrān
lang: Armenian
word: քրքում
roman: kʻrkʻum
lang: Asturian
word: azafrán
lang: Azerbaijani
word: zəfəran
lang: Bulgarian
word: шафран
roman: šafran
lang: Burmese
word: ကုံကုမံ
roman: kumku.mam
lang: Catalan
word: safranera
lang: Catalan
word: safrà
lang: Chinese Mandarin
word: 番紅花 /番红花
roman: fān hóng huā
lang: Chinese Mandarin
word: 藏紅花 /藏红花
roman: zànghónghuā
lang: Chinese Mandarin
word: 西紅花 /西红花
lang: Cornish
word: safran
lang: Czech
word: šafrán
lang: Danish
word: safran
lang: Dargwa
word: загӏпиран
roman: zaʿpiran
lang: Dutch
word: saffraankrokus
lang: Esperanto
word: safrano
lang: Estonian
word: safran
lang: Faroese
word: safran
lang: Finnish
word: maustesahrami
lang: French
word: safran
lang: Friulian
word: zafaran
lang: Galician
word: azafrán
lang: Galician
word: sasafrán
lang: Georgian
word: ზაფრანა
roman: zaprana
lang: German
word: Safran
lang: Greek
word: κρόκος
roman: krókos
lang: Ancient Greek
word: κρόκος
roman: krókos
lang: Mycenaean Greek
word: 𐁉
roman: CROC
lang: Hawaiian
word: keloko
lang: Hindi
word: केसर
roman: kesar
lang: Hindi
word: कुंकुम
roman: kuṅkum
lang: Hindi
word: कुमकुम
roman: kumkum
lang: Hindi
word: ज़ाफ़रान
roman: zāfrān
lang: Hungarian
word: sáfrány
lang: Ido
word: safrano
lang: Italian
word: zafferano
lang: Japanese
word: サフラン
roman: safuran
lang: Kannada
word: ಕೇಸರಿ
roman: kēsari
lang: Kashmiri
word: کۄنٛگ
roman: kọng
lang: Khmer
word: រមៀត
roman: rɔɔrɔmiət
lang: Lao
word: ຫຍ້າຝັ່ນ
roman: nyā fan
lang: Latin
word: crocus
lang: Latin
word: safranum
lang: Maltese
word: żagħfran
lang: Manx
word: crogh
lang: Marathi
word: केसर
roman: kesar
lang: Mongolian
word: гүргэм
roman: gürgem
lang: Norwegian Bokmål
word: safrankrokus
lang: Norwegian Nynorsk
word: safrankrokus
lang: Persian
word: زعفران
roman: za'ferân
lang: Piedmontese
word: safran
lang: Polish
word: szafran
lang: Polish
word: krokus
lang: Portuguese
word: açafrão
lang: Romagnol
word: ẓafarân
lang: Romanian
word: șofran
lang: Russian
word: шафра́н
roman: šafrán
lang: Sanskrit
word: कुङ्कुम
roman: kuṅkuma
lang: Serbo-Croatian
word: шафран
lang: Serbo-Croatian
word: šafran
lang: Slovak
word: šafran
lang: Slovene
word: žafran
lang: Spanish
word: azafrán
lang: Swahili
word: mzafarani
lang: Swedish
word: saffran
lang: Tamil
word: குங்குமப்பூ
roman: kuṅkumappū
lang: Thai
word: หญ้าฝรั่น
roman: ya faran
lang: Turkish
word: safran
lang: Turkmen
word: zagpyran
lang: Urdu
word: کیسر
roman: kesar
lang: Urdu
word: زعفران
roman: za'farān
lang: Venetan
word: croco
lang: Venetan
word: zafran
lang: Vietnamese
word: nghệ tây
lang: Volapük
word: safranakrok