etiolate

English

WOTD – 31 October 2011

Etymology

French étioler, from Norman French étieuler, ultimately from Old French estuble (“stubble”), from Latin stupla, from stipula (“straw, stubble”) (English stubble).

Pronunciation

enPR: ēʹtē-ə-lāt', IPA^(key): /ˈiːti.əleɪt/
Hyphenation: eti‧o‧late

Verb

etiolate (third-person singular simple present etiolates, present participle etiolating, simple past and past participle etiolated)

To make pale through lack of light, especially of a plant.
To make pale and sickly-looking.
- 1980, Anthony Burgess, Earthly Powers:
  She was a very lovely woman in her late thirties, in a silk dress of screaming scarlet that would have etiolated a white woman to bled veal.
- 1995, Martin Amis, The information:
  Gwynn and Richard were at the Westway Health and Fitness Centre, surrounded by thirty or forty etiolated drunks: playing snooker.
(intransitive) To become pale or blanched.

Related terms

stubble

Translations

to make pale through lack of light

German: etiolieren (de), vergeilen (de)
Greenlandic: asingavaa, paqqingavaa

Russian: этиолировать (ru) (etiolirovatʹ), обесцвечивать расте́ния (obescvečivatʹ rasténija)

to make a person pale and sickly-looking

Russian: бледне́ть (ru) (blednétʹ), станови́ться бледным (stanovítʹsja blednym)

Adjective

etiolate (comparative more etiolate, superlative most etiolate)

etiolated