bleach
verbEtymology From Middle English blechen, from Old English blǣċan (“to bleach, whiten”), from Proto-West Germanic *blaikijan, from Proto-Germanic *blaikijaną, from Proto-Indo-European *bʰel- (“to shine”). Cognate with Dutch bleken (“to bleach”), German bleichen (“to bleach”), Danish blege, Swedish bleka (“to bleach”). Related to Old English blāc (“pale”) (English blake; compare also bleak).
1
To treat with bleach, especially so as to whiten (fabric, paper, etc.) or lighten (hair).
- Candifacio, to make whyte, to bleache, to make to glowe lyke a burnyng cole.1538, Thomas Elyot, The Dictionary of Syr Thomas Eliot Knyght, London: Thomas Berthelet:
- The destruction of the colouring matters attached to the bodies to be bleached is effected either by the action of the air and light, of chlorine, or of sulphurous acid.1830, Andrew Ure, “BLEACHING”, in A Dictionary of Arts, Manufactures, and Mines, London: Longman, Orme, Brown, Green, & Longmans, page 128:
2
To be whitened or lightened (by the sun, for example).
- The white sheet bleaching on the hedge, With heigh! the sweet birds, O, how they sing!c. 1610–1611 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Winters Tale”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act IV, scene iii]:
- […] when Mrs. Giddy-gaddy came to take out her clothes, deep green stains appeared on every thing, for she had forgotten the green silk lining of a certain cape, and its color had soaked nicely into the pink and blue gowns, the little chemises, and even the best ruffled petticoat. […] “Lay them on the grass to bleach,” said Daisy, with an air of experience.1871, Louisa M[ay] Alcott, chapter 15, in Little Men: […], Boston, Mass.: Roberts Brothers, →OCLC:
1 more example
- The autumn trees, ravaged as they are, take on the flash of tattered flags kindling in the gloom of cool cathedral caves where gold letters on marble pages describe death in battle and how bones bleach and burn far away in Indian sands.1927, Virginia Woolf, To the Lighthouse, London: The Hogarth Press, published 1920, Part 2, p. 198:
3
Biology, Natural sciences Of corals To lose color due to stress-induced expulsion of symbiotic unicellular algae.
- Once coral bleaching begins, corals tend to continue to bleach even if the stressor is removed.
4
Figuratively To make meaningless; to divest of meaning; to make empty.
- semantically bleached words that have become illocutionary particles
- Synonyms
- blanch
- Derived terms
- bleachability, bleachable, bleacher, rebleach, sunbleach