adj.
1. Golden or gilded.
2. Brilliant; splendid.
3. Characterized by an ornate style of writing or speaking.
“Aureate,” which derives from the Latin aurum, for “gold,” means just that – golden. Its definition has expanded over time to include “resplendent,” “ornate,” and the like.
I’ve got to admit, I love color words. Sable, crimson, azure, viridian – with the right color words, you can add a lot of richness and flavor to a description. They’ve got to be employed correctly, of course, or they can seem silly or forced. “A girl with aureate hair” is okay, I guess, but “the aureate light of the warm, mid-day sun” has got a little extra umph.
She began to weep, and her briny tears fell down and were added to the briny waters.
Fain would I have comforted her, and I said:
“Weep not, for I will lift thee upon my wings and bear thee to some newer world, where the sky-blue waters of abounding seas are shattered to intricate webs of wannest foam, on low shores that are green and aureate with pristine spring. There, perchance for eons, thou shalt have thine abode, and galleys with painted oars and great barges purpureal-sailed shall be drawn upon thy rocks in the red light of sunsets domed with storm, and shall mingle the crash of their figured prows with the sweet sorcery of thy mortal singing.”
– Clark Ashton Smith, “Sadastor” (1930)
This is a new one for me!
Ah-ha! Glad to introduce a new word to a voracious reader like you!