twilight

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   a condition of decline following successes

   In the twilight of the empire.

2. 2
   noun

   the time of day immediately following sunset

   They loved the twilight.

3. 3
   noun

   The soft light in the sky seen before the rising and (especially) after the setting of the sun, occasioned by the illumination of the earth’s atmosphere by the direct rays of the sun and their reflection on the earth.

   Near-synonym: half-light.

4. 4
   noun

   The time when said light is visible; the period between daylight and darkness.

   It was twilight by the time I got back home.

Appears in

Simplified etymology

Twilight is a late medieval compound of twi-, a form of two, and light. The role of “two” is uncertain, but it may refer to the half-light between day and night.

PIE word *dwóh₁ From Middle English twilight, twyelyghte, equivalent to twi- (“double, half-”) + light, literally ‘second light, half-light’. Cognate to Scots twa licht, twylicht, twielicht (“twilight”), Low German twilecht, twelecht (“twilight”), Dutch tweelicht (“twilight, dusk”), German Zwielicht (“twilight, dusk”). Compare Old English twēone lēoht (“twilight”).

Topics

External links

• Google Images
• Cambridge Dictionary
• Wiktionary