mellow
adjEtymology
The adjective is derived from Late Middle English melowe, melwe (“ripe, mellow; juicy; sweet”) [and other forms]; further etymology uncertain, possibly: * from an attributive use of melow, melowe, melewe, mele (“meal from ground grain or legumes; flour; kernel of barley or lentils”) [and other forms], from Old English melo, melu (“meal (edible part of a grain or pulse); flour”), from Proto-Germanic *melwą (“ground corn; meal; flour”), from Proto-Indo-European *melh₂- (“to crush; to grind”); or * a variant of Middle English merow, merowe, meruw (“soft, tender; of a person: frail; of love: unstable, variable”) [and other forms], from Old English meru, mearu (“soft, tender; delicate, frail; callow”) [and other forms], from Proto-Germanic *marwaz (“soft, mellow; brittle, delicate”), from Proto-Indo-European *mer(w)- (“to rub; to pack”). The noun and verb are both derived from the adjective. The etymology of noun sense 3 (“close friend; lover”) is unknown, but may also be derived from the adjective. Cognates * Dutch murw (“tender”) * German mürbe (“soft, tender”) * German Low German möör (“tender”) * Old Norse mör (“tender; aching”) (Icelandic meyr (“tender”)) * Saterland Frisian muur (“tender”) * West Frisian murf (“tender”)
Definitions
Soft or tender by reason of ripeness
Soft or tender by reason of ripeness; having a tender pulp.
- a mellow apple
- Com[inius]. Hee'l ſhake your Rome about your eares. / Mene[nius]. As Hercules did ſhake downe Mellow Fruite: You haue made faire worke.
Matured and smooth, and not acidic, harsh, or sharp.
- The Claret ſmooth, deep as the lip vve preſs, / In ſparkling fancy, vvhile vve drain the bovvl; / The mellovv-taſted Burgundy; and quick, / As is the vvit it gives, the bright Champaign.
- [H]e was ready and willing to hear what I might have to say: his spirit was of vintage too mellow and generous to sour in one thunder-clap.
Soft and easily penetrated or worked
Soft and easily penetrated or worked; not hard or rigid; loamy.
- [A] wyse and counnynge gardener […] will first serche throughout his gardeyne where he can finde the most melowe and fertile erth: and therin wil he put the sede of the herbe to growe and be norisshed: […]
- This liketh moorie plots, delights in ſedgie Bovvres, / The graſſy garlands loues, and oft attyr'd with flovvres / Of ranke and mellovv gleabe; a ſwarde as ſoft as vvooll, / VVith her complexion ſtrong, a belly plumpe and full.
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Mature
Mature; of crops: ready to be harvested; ripe.
- Nor autumn yet had bruſh'd from ev'ry ſpray, / With her chill hand, the mellow leaves away; […]
Fruitful and warm.
- And mellow Autumn, charged with bounteous fruit, / Where is she imaged? in what favoured clime / Her lavish pomp, and ripe magnificence?
- Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness, / Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun; / Conspiring with him how to load and bless / With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eaves run; […]
Not coarse, brash, harsh, or rough
Not coarse, brash, harsh, or rough; delicate, rich, soft, subdued.
- How ſvveet and mellovv, and yet hovv Majeſtick, is the Sound of it!
- The mellow Harp did not their Ears employ: / And mute was all the Warlike Symphony: / Diſcourſe, the Food of Souls, was their Delight, / And pleaſing Chat, prolong'd the Summers-night.
Senses relating to a person or their qualities.
- The cauſe vvas mine, I might haue died for both: / My yeeres vvere mellow, his but young and greene, / My death vvere naturall, but his vvas forced.
- Lets ſee: no Maiſter Greene-wit is not yet / So mellow in yeares as he; […]
- By Day or Night, / In florid Youth, or mellow Age, ſcarce fleets / One Hour without its Care!
Pleasing in some way
Pleasing in some way; excellent, fantastic, great.
The property of being mellow
The property of being mellow; mellowness.
A comfortable or relaxed mood.
- Yet, conversely, some people searched for the mellow […] Hope for flower power had faded, though the journey into the mellow did not represent idealism; rather, it spelled escape— […]
- Nothing like a suicide to harsh a mellow. On their third date, Lizzie had actually said to him, "You're sort of harshing my mellow." It made him wonder if she might be stupid, and not just young.
Also main mellow
Also main mellow: a close friend or lover.
- I've got attractions like I'm Elvis Costello / Adam Yauch grab the mic 'cause you know you're my mellow
To cause (fruit) to become soft or tender, specifically by ripening.
- Then Olives, ground in Mills, their fatneſs boaſt, / And Winter Fruits are mellow'd by the Froſt.
- As time improves the grape's authentic juice, / Mellows and makes the ſpeech more fit for uſe, / And claims a rev'rence in its ſhort'ning day, / That 'tis an honour and a joy to pay.
- Ever since we last saw her, in the interval between the spring and the autumn, the year had ripened the youth of the maiden, as it had mellowed the fruits of the earth; […]
To cause (food or drink, for example, cheese or wine, or its flavour) to become matured…
To cause (food or drink, for example, cheese or wine, or its flavour) to become matured and smooth, and not acidic, harsh, or sharp.
To soften (land or soil) and make it suitable for planting in.
- This City is built of white Sun-burnt brickes, is watered with a ſmall ſtreame, which runs in two parts through the Towne, and meloes moſt of the Gardens and Groues within her, whereby ſhee yeelds a thankfull tribute of ſundry fruits.
- Having therefore made choice of ſome fit place of Ground, […] let it be Broken up the Winter before you ſow, to mellow it, eſpecially if it be a Clay, and then the furrow would be made deeper; […]
To reduce or remove the harshness or roughness from (something)
To reduce or remove the harshness or roughness from (something); to soften, to subdue, to tone down.
- The page was eaſily mellowd with his attractive eloquence, as what heart of adamant, or encloſed in a crocodyles ſkin (which no yron will pierce) that hath the power to withſtand the Mercurian heavenly charme of hys rhetorique?
To cause (a person) to become calmer, gentler, and more understanding, particularly from…
To cause (a person) to become calmer, gentler, and more understanding, particularly from age or experience.
- The fervour of early feeling is tempered and mellowed by the ripeness of age.
To cause (a person) to become slightly or pleasantly drunk or intoxicated.
- He found the bailiff riding by the farm, / And, talking from the point, he drew him in, / And there he mellow'd all his heart with ale, / Until they closed a bargain, hand in hand.
Followed by out
Followed by out: to relax (a person); in particular, to cause (a person) to become pleasantly high or stoned by taking drugs.
To mature and lose its harshness or sharpness.
To be rendered soft and suitable for planting in.
To lose harshness
To lose harshness; to become gentler, subdued, or toned down.
- So now proſperitie begins to mellow / And drop into the rotten mouth of Death: […]
- [T]ill death us lay / To ripe and mellow, here we're stubborn clay.
To relax
To relax; in particular, to become pleasantly high or stoned by taking drugs.
A surname.
The neighborhood
Vish — recursive loop
No curated loop yet for mellow. Loops are being traced one word at a time while the ingestion pipeline matures.
sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA