crimson

From Middle English cremesyn, from Old Spanish, from Arabic قِرْمِز‎ (qirmiz), from Persian کرمست‎ (kirmist), from Middle Persian, from Sanskrit कृमिज (kṛmija).

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈkɹɪmzən/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈkɹɪmzən/, /ˈkɹɪmsən/

crimson (countable and uncountable, plural crimsons) crimson on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

1. A deep, slightly bluish red.

   crimson colour:  

   • 1904, Arthur Conan Doyle, “The Adventure of the Priory School” in The Return of Sherlock Holmes,

     To my horror I perceived that the yellow blossoms were all dabbled with crimson.

crimson (comparative more crimson, superlative most crimson)

1. Having a deep red colour.
   • 1907, Robert William Chambers, chapter V, in The Younger Set, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, OCLC 24962326:

     Breezes blowing from beds of iris quickened her breath with their perfume; she saw the tufted lilacs sway in the wind, and the streamers of mauve-tinted wistaria swinging, all a-glisten with golden bees; she saw a crimson cardinal winging through the foliage, and amorous tanagers flashing like scarlet flames athwart the pines.

   • 1950, Mervyn Peake, Gormenghast

     Her crimson dress inflames grey corridors, or flaring in a sunshaft through high branches makes of the deep green shadows a greenness darker yet, and a darkness greener.

2. Immodest. (Can we add an example for this sense?)

crimson (third-person singular simple present crimsons, present participle crimsoning, simple past and past participle crimsoned)

1. (intransitive) To become crimson or deep red; to blush.
   • 1885, Alfred, Lord Tennyson, “The Ring” in The Poetical Works of Alfred, Lord Tennyson, New York and Boston: Thomas Y. Crowell & Co., Volume 2, p. 662,

     Father. Why do you look so gravely at the tower?

     Miram. I never saw it yet so all ablaze

     With creepers crimsoning to the pinnacles,

   • 1922, James Joyce, chapter 13, in Ulysses:

     Gerty MacDowell bent down her head and crimsoned at the idea of Cissy saying an unladylike thing like that out loud she'd be ashamed of her life to say, flushing a deep rosy red, and Edy Boardman said she was sure the gentleman opposite heard what she said. But not a pin cared Ciss.

2. (transitive) To dye with crimson or deep red; to redden.
   • c. 1599, William Shakespeare, Julius Caesar, Act III, Scene 1,

     Here didst thou fall; and here thy hunters stand,

     Sign’d in thy spoil, and crimson’d in thy lethe.

   • 1811, Jane Austen, Sense and Sensibility, London: Macmillan, 1902, Chapter 28, p. 153,

     Her face was crimsoned over, and she exclaimed, in a voice of the greatest emotion, “Good God! Willoughby, what is the meaning of this? […] ”

   • 1936, William Faulkner, Absalom, Absalom!, New York: Modern Library, 1951, Chapter 5, p. 138,

     […] that sheetless bed (that nuptial couch of love and grief) with the pale and bloody corpse in its patched and weathered gray crimsoning the bare mattress […]

• crimson lake

• kermes
• carmine

• (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, vermillion, vinaceous, vinous, violet red, wine ^{(Category: en:Reds)}

• microns