MOTTLE

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does mottle mean? 

• MOTTLE (noun)
  The noun MOTTLE has 1 sense:

1. an irregular arrangement of patches of color

  Familiarity information: MOTTLE used as a noun is very rare.

• MOTTLE (verb)
  The verb MOTTLE has 2 senses:

1. mark with spots or blotches of different color or shades of color as if stained

2. colour with streaks or blotches of different shades

  Familiarity information: MOTTLE used as a verb is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• MOTTLE (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

An irregular arrangement of patches of color

Classified under:

Nouns denoting attributes of people and objects

Context example:

it was not dull grey as distance had suggested, but a mottle of khaki and black and olive-green

Hypernyms ("mottle" is a kind of...):

color; coloring; colour; colouring (a visual attribute of things that results from the light they emit or transmit or reflect)

• MOTTLE (verb)

Present simple: I / you / we / they mottle    ... he / she / it mottles   
Past simple: mottled   
Past participle: mottled   
-ing form: mottling   

Sense 1

Meaning:

Mark with spots or blotches of different color or shades of color as if stained

Classified under:

Verbs of sewing, baking, painting, performing

Synonyms:

blotch; mottle; streak

Hypernyms (to "mottle" is one way to...):

color; color in; colorise; colorize; colour; colour in; colourise; colourize (add color to)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something

Derivation:

mottling (the act of coloring with areas of different shades)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Colour with streaks or blotches of different shades

Classified under:

Verbs of size, temperature change, intensifying, etc.

Synonyms:

cloud; dapple; mottle

Hypernyms (to "mottle" is one way to...):

spot (mark with a spot or spots so as to allow easy recognition)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "mottle"):

harlequin (variegate with spots or marks)

speckle; stipple (produce a mottled effect)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Something ----s something

Derivation:

mottling (the act of coloring with areas of different shades)

 Context examples 

The letter which had been the messenger of death for Milverton lay, all mottled with his blood, upon the table.

(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Sir, said the butler, turning to a sort of mottled pallor, that thing was not my master, and there’s the truth.

(The Strange Case Of Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

Every vein and crack and mottling of that face of rock remained forever stamped upon his memory.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

I was on some sort of a heathy common mottled over with dark clumps of furze-bushes.

(The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Dark brown dust lanes snake across the galaxy’s bright arms and center, giving it a mottled appearance.

(Lonely Galaxy Lost in Space, NASA)

Repeated falls had turned the men brown, with a horrible mottling of crimson blotches.

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Round one of his hands he had a handkerchief wrapped, which was mottled all over with bloodstains.

(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

MLN usually arises from the interaction of two viruses: maize chlorotic mottle virus (MSMV) and sugarcane mosaic virus (SCMV).

(Researchers model ways to control deadly maize disease, SciDev.Net)

Walking along the Strand, afterwards, and observing a hard mottled substance in the window of a ham and beef shop, which resembled marble, but was labelled Mock Turtle, I went in and bought a slab of it, which I have since seen reason to believe would have sufficed for fifteen people.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

The light/dark mottled pattern of Piri Planitia in the left inset is reflected in the composition map, with the lighter areas corresponding to areas richer in methane – these may be remnants of methane that have not yet sublimated away entirely.

(What’s Eating at Pluto?, NASA)