amber

Meaning

Adj

Of a brownish yellow colour, like that of most amber.

Noun

1. (countable, obsolete, uncountable) Ambergris, the waxy product of the sperm whale.
2. (countable, obsolete, uncountable) Ambergris, the waxy product of the sperm whale.
3. (countable, uncountable) A hard, generally yellow to brown translucent or transparent fossil resin from extinct coniferous trees of the pine genus, used for jewellery, decoration and later dissolved as a binder in varnishes. One variety, blue amber, appears blue rather than yellow under direct sunlight.
4. (countable, uncountable) A yellow-orange colour.
5. (Australia, British, countable, uncountable) The intermediate light in a set of three traffic lights, which when illuminated indicates that drivers should stop when safe to do so. See also yellow light.
6. (countable, uncountable) The stop codon (nucleotide triplet) "UAG", or a mutant which has this stop codon at a premature place in its DNA sequence.
7. (uncountable) Hesitance to proceed, or limited approval to proceed; an amber light.

Verb

1. (rare, transitive) To perfume or flavour with ambergris.
2. (rare, transitive) To preserve in amber.
3. (literary, poetic, rare, transitive) To cause to take on the yellow colour of amber.
4. (intransitive, literary, poetic, rare) To take on the yellow colour of amber.

Synonyms

necklace

yellow

umber

brownish-yellow

yellow-brown

gold

rounded

ambergris

yellowish

amber-colored

tawny-brown

yellowish-brown

red ball

chrysophoron

golden-brown

yellow light

scoopstone

auburn

golden

jasper

orange

🍊

rosin

tan

xanthous

Translations

ambre

Bernstein

ambra

ámbar

âmbar

ambre jaune

ambre

κεχριμπάρι

amber

barnsteen

kehribar

collier

Pronounced as (IPA)

/ˈam.bə/

Etymology

Inherited from Middle English: ambre

Cognate with English: lamber

In summary

From Middle English ambre, aumbre, from Old French aumbre, ambre, from Arabic عَنْبَر (ʕanbar, “ambergris”), from Middle Persian 𐭠𐭭𐭡𐭫 (ʾnbl /⁠ambar⁠/, “ambergris”). Compare English lamber, ambergris. Displaced Middle English smulting (from Old English smelting (“amber”)), Old English eolhsand (“amber”), Old English glær (“amber”), and Old English sāp (“amber, resin, pomade”).
* The nucleotide sequence "UAG" is named "amber" for the first person to isolate the amber mutation, California Institute of Technology graduate student Harris Bernstein, whose last name ("Bernstein") is the German word for the resin "amber".