1. Word finder
  2. Word definitions
  3. gleam

Find the word definition

What is "gleam"

Crossword clues for gleam

gleam
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
gleam
I.verb
COLLOCATIONS FROM OTHER ENTRIES
a gleam/glimmer/flicker of amusement (=a small amount in someone's eyes or on someone’s face)
▪ He examined her face with a wry gleam of amusement.
COLLOCATIONS FROM CORPUS
■ NOUN
hair
▪ The soft fall of her hair over her shoulders gleamed red in places.
▪ The dark hairs of his arm gleamed in the early morning light.
▪ Her giant picture shows her to be a full-faced woman with her hair gleaming unnaturally.
▪ Brushed the long hair till it gleamed?
▪ His curly dark hair gleamed even darker and glossier against the backdrop of red geraniums.
tooth
▪ Scarred with rust, its shark's teeth no longer gleaming, it looked almost harmless.
▪ His yellow teeth gleamed in the abundant black of his full beard.
▪ His even teeth gleamed falsely, vividly in the intense sunlight.
▪ Grover smiled mysteriously, his gold tooth gleaming.
▪ Miguelito knuckled the white rims into his nostrils, a mass of white teeth gleaming.
■ VERB
see
▪ I saw them gleam in the lamp-light.
▪ I could see their backs gleaming, like dark blue silk.
▪ Everyone expects, he reasoned, to see large, gleaming spaceships orbiting planets.
▪ It left a mark, they could see it now, gleaming on the sand as muddy swell crawled away.
EXAMPLES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
▪ A Rolls Royce was parked outside, gleaming in the sunshine.
▪ John's face gleamed as he thought of his plan for revenge.
▪ On his left was the galley, a tiny kitchen gleaming with stainless steel.
▪ The floors gleamed, and the house smelled sweetly of soap and fresh air.
▪ The old walnut dining table gleamed under the chandelier.
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ Grover smiled mysteriously, his gold tooth gleaming.
▪ He gleamed blue-yellow in the night.
▪ On either side her head gleamed coiled braids of dark-gold hair, almost pale copper in the subdued light of the room.
▪ She went back into school, brow furrowed, eyes gleaming.
▪ The ledges gleamed in the air briefly in the gray light then plummeted as the water gargled and spat all around them.
II.noun
COLLOCATIONS FROM CORPUS
■ VERB
see
▪ At last, faint and far off in the total blackness which now surrounded him, he saw another gleam of light.
▪ She saw the gleam through the green, she could not resist it.
▪ Now, seeing the sober blue gleam from the Police Station she went in.
▪ I could see the gleam of arms and the twinkling of bayonets.
▪ She saw the gleam of excitement in his eyes as she swallowed.
▪ She saw water gleam from the roadside ditch, smelled wet grass.
▪ Rincewind saw the gleam of gold and bronze.
▪ On the second day after she first saw the white gleam she saw it again in the same place.
EXAMPLES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
▪ I heard the back door of the house open, and saw the gleam of a lantern.
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ But he was a sucker for that gleam in her eye.
▪ His shoes are spit-shined and the buttons on his jersey gleam.
▪ Maybe there was going to be a gleam of light this morning.
▪ Now and then the gleam of a flashlight would wink out through the shrubbery.
▪ She remembered him and Agape said quite a gleam came in her eye.
▪ Sure enough, her eyes could see the faint satiny gleam of his bronze skin.
▪ The whole building was painted the frost white of cake icing and its shine echoed the gleam of the silent Thames behind.
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Gleam

Gleam \Gleam\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Gleamed; p. pr. & vb. n. Gleaming.]

  1. To shoot, or dart, as rays of light; as, at the dawn, light gleams in the east.

  2. To shine; to cast light; to glitter.

    Syn: To Gleam, Glimmer, Glitter.

    Usage: To gleam denotes a faint but distinct emission of light. To glimmer describes an indistinct and unsteady giving of light. To glitter imports a brightness that is intense, but varying. The morning light gleams upon the earth; a distant taper glimmers through the mist; a dewdrop glitters in the sun. See Flash.

Gleam

Gleam \Gleam\, v. i. [Cf. OE. glem birdlime, glue, phlegm, and E. englaimed.] (Falconry) To disgorge filth, as a hawk.

Gleam

Gleam \Gleam\, n. [OE. glem, gleam, AS. gl[ae]m, prob. akin to E. glimmer, and perh. to Gr. ? warm, ? to warm. Cf. Glitter.]

  1. A shoot of light; a small stream of light; a beam; a ray; a glimpse.

    Transient unexpected gleams of joi.
    --Addison.

    At last a gleam Of dawning light turned thitherward in haste His [Satan's] traveled steps.
    --Milton.

    A glimmer, and then a gleam of light.
    --Longfellow.

  2. Brightness; splendor.

    In the clear azure gleam the flocks are seen.
    --Pope.

Gleam

Gleam \Gleam\, v. t. To shoot out (flashes of light, etc.).

Dying eyes gleamed forth their ashy lights.
--Shak.

Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
gleam

Old English glæm "brilliant light; brightness, splendor, radiance," from Proto-Germanic *glaimiz (cognates: Old Saxon glimo "brightness;" Middle High German glim "spark," gleime "glowworm;" German glimmen "to glimmer, glow;" Old Norse glija "to shine, glitter"), from root *glim-, from PIE *ghel- (2) "to shine," with derivatives referring to bright materials and gold (see glass).

gleam

early 13c., from gleam (n). Related: Gleamed; gleaming.\n

Wiktionary
gleam

n. 1 a small or indistinct shaft or stream of light. 2 a glimpse or hint; an indistinct sign of something. 3 brightness or shininess; splendor. vb. 1 To shine; to glitter; to glisten. 2 To be briefly but strongly apparent. 3 (context obsolete falconry English) To disgorge filth, as a hawk.

WordNet
gleam

  1. n. an appearance of reflected light [syn: gleaming, glow, lambency]

  2. a flash of light (especially reflected light) [syn: gleaming, glimmer]

  3. v. be shiny, as if wet; "His eyes were glistening" [syn: glitter, glisten, glint, shine]

  4. shine brightly, like a star or a light [syn: glimmer]

  5. appear briefly; "A terrible thought gleamed in her mind"

Wikipedia
Gleam (album)

Gleam is a live album recorded in 1975 by jazz trumpeter Freddie Hubbard. It was released as a double LP on Sony Music Japan and features a live performance recorded in Tokyo by Hubbard, Carl Randall, George Cables, Henry Franklin, Carl Burnett and Buck Clark. The selections are extended performances of material from Hubbard's recent albums "High Energy" and "Polar AC"; as well as three songs from the upcoming and as of then unrecorded album "Liquid Love". (Sessions for "Liquid Love" began the day after this concert.) In 2012 the album was released as a double cd on the Wounded Bird label.

Gleam

Gleam may refer to:

  • reflectivity
  • Gleam (album)
  • The Gleam
  • Gay and Lesbian Employees at Microsoft (GLEAM)
  • Samsung SCH-u700, also called the "Samsung Gleam"
  • GLEaM, Global Epidemic and Mobility Model

Usage examples of "gleam".

Suddenly, Abrim wanted nothing so much as to exit this gleaming sterile bubble and get back to his crowded, cluttered ship.

With a redder, more abysmal gleam in his deep dark eyes he told of men and women flayed alive, mutilated and dismembered, of captives howling under tortures so ghastly that even the barbarous Cimmerian grunted.

She glanced down at her own nakedness, accessorized with gleaming surgical steel.

Suddenly she heard movement in the undergrowth and whirled to see Acorn lunging toward her with a crazed gleam in his eyes.

Sevilla with some muledrivers who had decided to stop at the inn that night, and since everything our adventurer thought, saw, or imagined seemed to happen according to what he had read, as soon as he saw the inn it appeared to him to be a castle complete with four towers and spires of gleaming silver, not to mention a drawbridge and deep moat and all the other details depicted on such castles.

Tarrant entered the aeroponics room, the gleaming white PVC pipe and enameled steel in shining contrast to the dim red of the fishery.

Now, as he stood before her, naked torso gleaming in the candlelight, muscles rippling, eyes afire with their ebony fury, she was bleakly sorry.

Minutes later his airmobile was at two thousand feet and climbing to merge into an eastbound traffic corridor with the rainbow towers of Houston gleaming in the sunlight on the skyline ahead.

As he jumped hastily to his feet, his face very red and his mouth flowing with apologies to the alcalde for his clumsiness, he glanced downward swiftly into one of his hands, and then, with another quick gleam of cunning triumph in his eyes, he quickly slipped the hand into one of his pockets, and, taking his place in front of the barrel, faced the alcalde.

Had there been a light in her belly, dim briny light in that pillowing womb, dusk enough to light a page, bacterial smear of light, an amniotic gleam that I could taste, old, deep, wet and warm?

And before she had any time to prepare herself for it, there they stood on the embankment, with the Grand Canal opening resplendently before them in gleaming amorphous blues and greens and olives and silvers, and the tottering palace fronts of marble and inlay leaning over to look at their faces in it, and the mooring poles, top-heavy, striped, lantern-headed, bristling outside the doorways in the cobalt-shadowed water, and the sudden bunches of piles propped together like drunks holding one another up outside an English pub after closing time.

But that transitory gleam of the true animalism of these monsters was enough.

Raoul-technology skin, and they reached respectfully to stroke the gleaming egg-shaped Memory that Arles held in his hand.

Golden bracelets and armbands gleamed upon each wrist and armthe gifts of grateful kings and princes whom she had served.

Many of the plantations carried billboards with the AFI logo and others, and there was even another AFI plant research station, a small complex of gleaming glass and chrome that looked as if it would be more at home on the Bath Road out of London than in the middle of Africa.