Complete classic literature • Five-line readings • Clear US narration
VELMORA ACADEMY
Academy of Archival Languages & Memory Studies
Menu Close

purple

noun · adjective · verb US /ˈpɜːrpəl/

a purple color or pigment

How often you will meet it

Rank 2,467 of 71,295 words measured. It occurs 6,915 times across 155,139 chapters — 0.003% of every word in the library.

What it means

noun

  1. a purple color or pigment also: purpleness
  2. (in ancient Rome) position of imperial status also: the purple he was born to the purple
  3. (Roman Catholic Church) official dress of a cardinal; so named after the Tyrial purple color of the robes also: the purple

adjective

  1. of a color intermediate between red and blue also: violet, purplish
  2. excessively elaborate or showily expressed also: empurpled, over-embellished a writer of empurpled literaturemany purple passages
  3. belonging to or befitting a supreme ruler also: imperial, majestic, regal, royal golden age of imperial splendorpurple tyrant

verb

  1. become purple
  2. color purple also: empurple, purpurate

CMU Pronouncing Dictionary · Princeton WordNet 3.1

purple in real books

Each sentence below was written by a published author and is taken from a different book in our library. Open one to read the passage it came from, with narration.

  • Blow, let us hear the purple glens replying: Blow, bugle; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying.

    Poems Every Child Should Know · Mary E. (Mary Elizabeth) [Editor] Burt · Chapter 1

  • When his old kinsman entered, Cambyses was lying on his purple couch, pale as death.

    An Egyptian Princess — Volume 07 · Georg Ebers · Chapter 1

  • Proud in the Syrian sun, In gold and purple sheen, The dusky Ethiop queen Smiled on King Solomon.

    Pennsylvania Pilgrim, and other poems Part 6 From — Volume I · John Greenleaf Whittier · Chapter 1

  • The Major stepped into a rich, glowing room, full of red copper, and peacock and purple hangings, hat in hand.

    The Club of Queer Trades · G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton · Chapter 1

  • Why, it was a great big dewdrop, right in the middle of a purple violet, that was growing underneath a shady fern.

    Uncle Wiggily's Travels · Howard Roger Garis · Chapter 1

Nearby in the frequency table

The whole table Read a book