carmine

English

Etymology

From French carmin, from irregular Medieval Latin carminium, itself from Arabic قِرْمِز (qirmiz, “crimson, kermes”) from Persian *کرمست (*kermest), ultimately from Proto-Indo-Iranian *kŕ̥miš (“worm”), plus or with influence from Latin minium. Compare crimson and kermes.

Noun

carmine (countable and uncountable, plural carmines)

1. A purplish-red pigment, made from dye obtained from the cochineal beetle; carminic acid or any of its derivatives.
   • 1967, Time, "The Case of the Dubious Dye," 6 January, 1967,

     Cases of cubana salmonellosis in three other states were traced to carmine red, and supplies were called in. But authorities have been checking other places for carmine red, knowing that it is a favorite coloring in candy, chewing gum, ice cream, cough syrups and drugs. Manufacturers like to use it because of a legal quirk: being a natural rather than a synthetic product, it does not have to be mentioned on labels.

2. A purplish-red colour, resembling that pigment.
   • 1854, Henry David Thoreau, chapter XIV, in Walden‎, New York: Thomas Y. Crowell & Co, published 1910, page 347:

     He wore a great coat in midsummer, being affected with the trembling delirium, and his face was the color of carmine.

   • c. 1862, Emily Dickinson, “(please specify the chapter or poem)”, in M[abel] L[oomis] Todd and M[illicent] T[odd] Bingham, editors, Bolts of Melody, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Row, published 1945, page 140:

     I am alive, I guess, / The branches on my hand / Are full of morning-glory, / And at my fingers' end / The carmine tingles warm,

   • 1920, F. Scott Fitzgerald, chapter 5, in This Side of Paradise‎:

     He pictured himself in an adobe house in Mexico, half-reclining on a rug-covered couch, his slender, artistic fingers closed on a cigarette while he listened to guitars strumming melancholy undertones to an age-old dirge of Castile and an olive-skinned, carmine-lipped girl caressed his hair.

   • 1938 April, George Orwell [pseudonym; Eric Arthur Blair], chapter IV, in Homage to Catalonia, London: Secker & Warburg, →OCLC:

     […] the dawn breaking behind the hill-tops in our rear, the first narrow streaks of gold, like swords slitting the darkness, and then the growing light and the seas of carmine cloud stretching away into inconceivable distances […]

   • 1987, Toni Morrison, Beloved, New York: Vintage, published 2004, page 33:

     The velvet I seen was brown, but in Boston they got all colors. Carmine. That means red but when you talk about velvet you got to say 'carmine.'

   carmine:  

Synonyms

• (pigment): crimson, cochineal, C.I. 75470, E120

Derived terms

Translations

Adjective

carmine

1. Of the purplish red colour shade carmine.

Translations

See also

• (reds) red; blood red, brick red, burgundy, cardinal, carmine, carnation, cerise, cherry, cherry red, Chinese red, cinnabar, claret, crimson, damask, fire brick, fire engine red, flame, flamingo, fuchsia, garnet, geranium, gules, hot pink, incarnadine, Indian red, magenta, maroon, misty rose, nacarat, oxblood, pillar-box red, pink, Pompeian red, poppy, raspberry, red violet, rose, rouge, ruby, ruddy, salmon, sanguine, scarlet, shocking pink, stammel, strawberry, Turkey red, Venetian red, vermilion, vinaceous, vinous, violet red, wine ^{(Category: en:Reds)}

References

Anagrams

• Crimean, Mercian, ceriman, minecar

French

Pronunciation

• Audio

  (file)

Verb

carmine

1. inflection of carminer:
   1. first/third-person singular present indicative/subjunctive
   2. second-person singular imperative

Latin

Noun

carmine

1. ablative singular of carmen

References

• carmine in Charles du Fresne du Cange’s Glossarium Mediæ et Infimæ Latinitatis (augmented edition with additions by D. P. Carpenterius, Adelungius and others, edited by Léopold Favre, 1883–1887)

Spanish

Verb

carmine

1. inflection of carminar:
   1. first/third-person singular present subjunctive
   2. third-person singular imperative