Library / English Dictionary

EBONY

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 I. (noun) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

A very dark black

Synonyms:

coal black; ebony; jet black; pitch black; sable; soot black

Classified under:

Nouns denoting attributes of people and objects

Hypernyms ("ebony" is a kind of...):

black; blackness; inkiness (the quality or state of the achromatic color of least lightness (bearing the least resemblance to white))

Derivation:

ebonize (stain black to make it look like ebony)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Tropical tree of southern Asia having hard dark-colored heartwood used in cabinetwork

Synonyms:

Diospyros ebenum; ebony; ebony tree

Classified under:

Nouns denoting plants

Hypernyms ("ebony" is a kind of...):

tree (a tall perennial woody plant having a main trunk and branches forming a distinct elevated crown; includes both gymnosperms and angiosperms)

Meronyms (substance of "ebony"):

ebony (hard dark-colored heartwood of the ebony tree; used in cabinetwork and for piano keys)

Holonyms ("ebony" is a member of...):

Diospyros; genus Diospyros (a genus of trees or shrubs that have beautiful and valuable wood)

Sense 3

Meaning:

Hard dark-colored heartwood of the ebony tree; used in cabinetwork and for piano keys

Classified under:

Nouns denoting plants

Hypernyms ("ebony" is a kind of...):

wood (the hard fibrous lignified substance under the bark of trees)

Holonyms ("ebony" is a substance of...):

Diospyros ebenum; ebony; ebony tree (tropical tree of southern Asia having hard dark-colored heartwood used in cabinetwork)

 II. (adjective) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Of a very dark black

Synonyms:

ebon; ebony

Classified under:

Adjectives

Similar:

achromatic; neutral (having no hue)

Credits

 Context examples: 

And thus Snowdrop lay for a long, long time, and still only looked as though she was asleep; for she was even now as white as snow, and as red as blood, and as black as ebony.

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)

It was not absolutely ebony and gold; but it was japan, black and yellow japan of the handsomest kind; and as she held her candle, the yellow had very much the effect of gold.

(Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen)

Then she gazed thoughtfully upon the red drops that sprinkled the white snow, and said, Would that my little daughter may be as white as that snow, as red as that blood, and as black as this ebony windowframe!

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)