vivid
English
Etymology
Borrowed from Latin vividus (“animated, spirited”), from vivere (“to live”), akin to vita (“life”), Ancient Greek βίος (bíos, “life”).
The noun sense (a type of marker pen) was genericized from a brand name.
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /ˈvɪvɪd/
Audio (US) (file) - Rhymes: -ɪvɪd
Adjective
vivid (comparative vivider, superlative vividest)
- (of perception) Clear, detailed or powerful.
- (of an image) Bright, intense or colourful.
- 1959 March, “The 2,500 h.p. electric locomotives for the Kent Coast electrification”, in Trains Illustrated, page 125:
- Whenever the locomotive was working hard there was unmistakable evidence of its higher power than its predecessors in the brilliant and explosive arcing between conductor shoes and the third rail; this was particularly vivid in Quarry Tunnel in the down direction, where the display equalled anything we have seen on the frostiest of nights in an electrified third-rail area.
- 1963, Margery Allingham, chapter 1, in The China Governess:
- The half-dozen pieces […] were painted white and carved with festoons of flowers, birds and cupids. To display them the walls had been tinted a vivid blue which had now faded, but the carpet, which had evidently been stored and recently relaid, retained its original turquoise.
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- Full of life, strikingly alive.
- 1907, Harold Bindloss, chapter 32, in The Dust of Conflict:
- The vivid, untrammeled life appealed to him, and for a time he had found delight in it; but he was wise and knew that once peace was established there would be no room in Cuba for the Sin Verguenza.
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Derived terms
- vividly
- vividness
Related terms
English terms derived from the Proto-Indo-European root *gʷeyh₃- (0 c, 26 e)
Translations
clear, detailed or powerful
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bright, intense or colourful
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- The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.
Translations to be checked
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Noun
vivid (plural vivids)
- (New Zealand) A felt-tipped permanent marker.
Further reading
- vivid in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913
- vivid in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911
Spanish
Verb
vivid
- second-person plural imperative of vivir