beige

English

Etymology

Unadapted borrowing from French (dialectal) beige, from Old French bege (“color of undyed wool or cotton”), from an Alpine language (compare Franco-Provençal bézho, Romansch besch (“dull grey”)), from Vulgar Latin *bysseus (“cottony grey”) (compare French bis, Catalan bis, Italian bigio), from Late Latin byssus (“cotton”), from Ancient Greek βύσσος (bússos, “cotton homespun”), from Semitic (compare Hebrew/Aramaic בוץ (būṣ)). Doublet of bice.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈbeɪʒ/, /ˈbeɪd͡ʒ/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -eɪʒ, -eɪdʒ

Noun

beige (countable and uncountable, plural beiges)

1. A slightly yellowish gray colour, as that of unbleached wool.

   beige:  

2. Debeige; a kind of woollen or mixed dress goods.

Translations

Adjective

beige (comparative beiger or more beige, superlative beigest or most beige)

1. Having a slightly yellowish gray colour, as that of unbleached wool.

   Synonyms: bland, indistinct, colorless, drab

   • 1956, Delano Ames, chapter 24, in Crime out of Mind‎:

     Dagobert had only one customer, an American who wore square, rimless glasses and a beige suit and looked like a Wall Street tycoon.

   • 2006 November 23, Michel Marriott, “When Beige Won’t Do”, in The New York Times‎, →ISSN:

     Mr. Lauwaert of Sony said he realized that most consumers were not going to buy computers that cost far more than discount beige boxes.

2. (informal, originally US) Comfortably dull and unadventurous, in a way that suggests middle-class suburbia.

   Synonyms: bland, tedious

   • 2007, Prairie L. Markussen, Cover, page 48:

     Think about it: he grew up in Iowa, the beigest of states, was doted on, loved generously by his parents, the top of his class, probably voted Most Handsome of 2000.

   • 2010, Gerald J. McCarthy, A Man of Substances:

     In the beigest parts of suburbia where I grew up, bridge was a game played by groups of parents in recreation rooms furnished with upright pianos and souvenir sombreros.

   • 2013 March 25, Eric Asimov, “A Beige Wine for a Beige Meal”, in NYT Diner’s Journal Blog‎:

     For a meal of relentlessly beige food, may I suggest the beigest of wines? That would be chardonnay, which will go beautifully with Melissa Clark’s chicken potpie.

   • 2016, Penelope Garcia, “The Witness”, in Criminal Minds, season 11, episode 2:

     He has no criminal record. He has no traffic tickets. His social media posts are just like... he's beige.

Derived terms

Translations

See also

• Appendix:Colors

Further reading

• beige on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• Jonathon Green (2024) “beige adj.”, in Green’s Dictionary of Slang

Afrikaans

Etymology

From Dutch beige, from French beige.

Pronunciation

• Audio

  (file)

Adjective

beige (attributive beige, comparative beiger, superlative beigeste)

1. beige

Dutch

Etymology

Unadapted borrowing from French beige, from Middle French beige, from Old French bege.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈbɛːʒə/

• audio

  (file)

• Hyphenation: bei‧ge

Adjective

beige (comparative beiger, superlative meest beige or beigest)

1. beige

Inflection

Derived terms

• beigeachtig

Finnish

Alternative forms

• beesi, bees

Etymology

Unadapted borrowing from French beige.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈbei̯ɡe/,
• IPA^(key): /ˈbeːʒi/,
• Rhymes: -eiɡe
• Syllabification^(key): bei‧ge

Adjective

beige (comparative beigempi, superlative beigein)

1. beige

Declension

Noun

beige

1. beige (color)

Declension

Further reading

• “beige”, in Kielitoimiston sanakirja [Dictionary of Contemporary Finnish]‎ (in Finnish) (online dictionary, continuously updated), Kotimaisten kielten keskuksen verkkojulkaisuja 35, Helsinki: Kotimaisten kielten tutkimuskeskus (Institute for the Languages of Finland), 2004–, retrieved 2023-07-02

French

Etymology

Inherited from Old French bege.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /bɛʒ/

• Audio

  (file)

Adjective

beige (plural beiges)

1. beige

Descendants

Further reading

• “beige”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé , 2012.

German

Etymology 1

Unadapted borrowing from French beige.

Pronunciation

• Predicative form: IPA^(key): /beːʃ/, /bɛːʃ/
• Inflected forms: IPA^(key): /beːʒə/, /bɛːʒə/, /beːʃə/, /bɛːʃə/
• Rhymes: -eːʃə, -eːʃ, -ɛːʃ, -ɛːʒə, -eːʒə, -ɛːʃə

Adjective

beige (strong nominative masculine singular beiger, not comparable)

1. beige

Usage notes

Beige is inflected like a regular adjective in pronunciation. However, since its basic form is written with a mute -e, the inflectional ending -e is not visible in writing: das beige Haus – the beige house.

The other inflectional endings are visible: in dem beigen Haus – in the beige house.

Declension

Related terms

• Beige

Etymology 2

See the etymology of the corresponding lemma form.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈbaɪ̯ɡə/
• Hyphenation: bei‧ge

Verb

beige

1. inflection of beigen:
   1. first-person singular present
   2. first/third-person singular subjunctive I
   3. singular imperative

Further reading

• “beige” in Duden online
• “beige” in Digitales Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache

Luxembourgish

Etymology

Borrowed from French beige.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈbeːʃ/

• audio

  (file)

Adjective

beige (masculine beigen, neuter beiget, comparative méi beige, superlative am beigesten)

1. beige

Declension

This adjective needs an inflection-table template.

Norwegian Bokmål

Alternative forms

• besj (alternative spelling)

Adjective

beige (singular and plural beige)

1. beige

References

• “beige” in The Bokmål Dictionary.

Norwegian Nynorsk

Alternative forms

• besj (alternative spelling)

Adjective

beige (singular and plural beige, comparative beigare, indefinite superlative beigast, definite superlative beigaste)

1. beige

References

• “beige” in The Nynorsk Dictionary.

Spanish

Etymology

Unadapted borrowing from French beige.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈbeiʃ/
  • Rhymes: -eiʃ
• IPA^(key): /ˈbeis/
  • Rhymes: -eis
• IPA^(key): /ˈbeʃ/
  • Rhymes: -eʃ

Adjective

beige (invariable)

1. Alternative form of beis

Noun

beige m (uncountable)

1. Alternative form of beis

Usage notes

According to Royal Spanish Academy (RAE) prescriptions, unadapted foreign words should be written in italics in a text printed in roman type, and vice versa, and in quotation marks in a manuscript text or when italics are not available. In practice, this RAE prescription is not always followed.

Further reading

• “beige”, in Diccionario de la lengua española, Vigésima tercera edición, Real Academia Española, 2014

Swedish

Etymology

Attested from 1895. Unadapted borrowing from French beige. The slang definition is likely associated to the perceived blandness of the color.

Pronunciation

• (Sweden) IPA^(key): /beːɧ/, /bɛːɧ/
• Rhymes: -eːɧ, -ɛːɧ

Adjective

beige

1. beige.

   Hon hade en lång, beige kappa på sig.

   She wore a long, beige coat.

2. (slang) boring, uninteresting, negative.

   Din morsa är så jävla beige!

   Your mother is so damn dull.

Declension