| English Dictionary |
SUBLIME
| Pronunciation (US): |  | (GB): | |
| IPA (US): |  |
Dictionary entry overview: What does sublime mean?
• SUBLIME (adjective)
The adjective SUBLIME has 5 senses:
1. inspiring awe
2. worthy of adoration or reverence
3. lifted up or set high
4. of high moral or intellectual value; elevated in nature or style
5. greatest or maximal in degree; extreme
Familiarity information: SUBLIME used as an adjective is common.
• SUBLIME (verb)
The verb SUBLIME has 2 senses:
1. vaporize and then condense right back again
2. change or cause to change directly from a solid into a vapor without first melting
Familiarity information: SUBLIME used as a verb is rare.
Dictionary entry details
Sense 1
Meaning:
Inspiring awe
Synonyms:
Context example:
the sublime beauty of the night
Similar:
glorious (having or deserving or conferring glory)
Sense 2
Meaning:
Worthy of adoration or reverence
Synonyms:
reverend; sublime
Similar:
sacred (concerned with religion or religious purposes)
Sense 3
Meaning:
Lifted up or set high
Context example:
their hearts were jocund and sublime
Similar:
elated (exultantly proud and joyful; in high spirits)
Domain usage:
archaicism; archaism (the use of an archaic expression)
Derivation:
sublimity (nobility in thought or feeling or style)
Sense 4
Meaning:
Of high moral or intellectual value; elevated in nature or style
Synonyms:
elevated; exalted; grand; high-flown; high-minded; idealistic; lofty; noble-minded; rarefied; rarified; sublime
Context example:
a grand purpose
Similar:
noble (having or showing or indicative of high or elevated character)
Sense 5
Meaning:
Greatest or maximal in degree; extreme
Synonyms:
sublime; supreme
Context example:
His face assumed an expression of sublime conceit
Similar:
maximal; maximum (the greatest or most complete or best possible)
| Conjugation: |
... he / she / it sublimes Past simple: sublimed
Past participle: sublimed
-ing form: subliming
Sense 1
Meaning:
Vaporize and then condense right back again
Classified under:
Verbs of size, temperature change, intensifying, etc.
Synonyms:
sublimate; sublime
Hypernyms (to "sublime" is one way to...):
change (undergo a change; become different in essence; losing one's or its original nature)
"Sublime" entails doing...:
condense (cause a gas or vapor to change into a liquid)
evaporate; vaporise; vaporize (lose or cause to lose liquid by vaporization leaving a more concentrated residue)
Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "sublime"):
resublime (sublime (a compound) once again)
Sentence frame:
Something ----s
Derivation:
sublimate (the product of vaporization of a solid)
Sense 2
Meaning:
Change or cause to change directly from a solid into a vapor without first melting
Classified under:
Verbs of size, temperature change, intensifying, etc.
Synonyms:
sublimate; sublime
Context example:
some salts sublime when heated
Hypernyms (to "sublime" is one way to...):
aerify; gasify; vaporise; vaporize (turn into gas)
Sentence frames:
Something ----s
Something ----s something
Context examples
These sublime and magnificent scenes afforded me the greatest consolation that I was capable of receiving.
(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)
His attitude to me was the same as that to the attendant; in his sublime self-feeling the difference between myself and attendant seemed to him as nothing.
(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)
It sublimes into water vapor in the planet's thin, dry atmosphere.
(Mars Ice Deposit Holds as Much Water as Lake Superior, NASA)
These women, capable of the most sublime emotions, of the tenderest sympathies, were open-mouthed and screaming.
(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)
All men of talent, whether they be men of feeling or not; whether they be zealots, or aspirants, or despots—provided only they be sincere—have their sublime moments, when they subdue and rule.
(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)
Mars in Capricorn will send a sublime beam to the new moon, indicating a trip could turn out to be possible now.
(AstrologyZone.com, by Susan Miller)
She ran away to indulge the inclination, leaving the tender and the sublime of pleasure to Harriet's share.
(Emma, by Jane Austen)
Always in sublime carelessness had he lived, till now, and now it seemed to him that they had always reached out and dragged at him with vile hands.
(Martin Eden, by Jack London)
In the P.M. to Westminster Abbey, but don't expect me to describe it, that's impossible, so I'll only say it was sublime!
(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)
Io’s thin atmosphere, which consists primarily of sulfur dioxide (SO2) gas emitted from volcanoes, collapses as the SO2 freezes onto the surface as ice when Io is shaded by Jupiter, then is restored when the ice warms and sublimes (i.e. transforms from solid back to gas) when the moon moves out of eclipse back into sunlight.
(New Research Reveals Fluctuating Atmosphere of Jupiter’s Volcanic Moon, NASA)
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