shades

shade  (shd)

n.

1. Light diminished in intensity as a result of the interception of the rays; partial darkness.

2. An area or a space of partial darkness.

3. Cover or shelter provided by interception by an object of the sun or its rays.

4. Any of various devices used to reduce or screen light or heat.

5. shades Slang Sunglasses.

6. Relative obscurity.

7. shades

a. Dark shadows gathering at dusk: "The shades of night are falling fast" (Henry Wadsworth Longfellow).

b. The abode of the dead; the underworld.

8. The part of a picture or photograph depicting darkness or shadow.

9. The degree to which a color is mixed with black or is decreasingly illuminated; gradation of darkness.

10. A slight difference or variation; a nuance: shades of meaning.

11. A small amount; a trace: detected a shade of bitterness in her remarks.

12. A disembodied spirit; a ghost.

13. shades A present reminder of a person or situation in the past: shades of my high-school days.

v. shad·ed, shad·ing, shades

v.tr.

1. To screen from light or heat.

2. To obscure or darken.

3. To cause shade in or on.

4.

a. To represent degrees of shade or shadow in: shade a drawing.

b. To produce (gradations of light or color) in a drawing or picture.

5. To change or vary by slight degrees: shade the meaning.

6. To make a slight reduction in: shade prices.

v.intr.

To pass from one quality, color, or thing to another by very slight changes or degrees.

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[Middle English, from Old English sceadu.]

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shader n.

Synonyms: shade, penumbra, shadow, umbra, umbrage
These nouns denote an area of comparative darkness resulting from the blocking of light rays: sitting in the shade; Earth's penumbra; in the shadow of the curtains; the umbra beyond the footlights; in the umbrage of a forest. See Also Synonyms at nuance.

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shades [ʃeɪdz]

pl n

1. gathering darkness at nightfall

2. (Clothing & Fashion) a slang word for sunglasses

3. (Myth & Legend / Classical Myth & Legend) (often capital; preceded by the) a literary term for Hades

4. (foll by of) undertones or suggestions shades of my father!

Thesaurus

Noun

1.

shades - spectacles that are darkened or polarized to protect the eyes from the glare of the sun; "he was wearing a pair of mirrored shades" dark glasses, sunglasses Polaroid - (trade mark) a plastic film that can polarize a beam of light; often used in sunglasses to eliminate glare eyeglasses, glasses, specs, spectacles - optical instrument consisting of a frame that holds a pair of lenses for correcting defective vision plural, plural form - the form of a word that is used to denote more than one