Skip to content
ontologydriven
Sign out

Dictionary

Words, grammatical forms and meanings linked to the ontology.

seafire en · NOUN

Etymology

Etymology tree English sea Proto-Indo-European *péh₂wr̥ Proto-Germanic *fōr Proto-West Germanic *fuir Old English fȳr Middle English fyr English fire English seafire From sea + fire. Compare Shetland mareel from Old Norse marr (“sea”) + eldr (“fire”), and marfire.

Meanings

  1. Light which sometimes occurs (caused by the bioluminescence or biophosphorescence of certain organisms) and is visible in seawater on dark nights, typically a pale blue or green colour.
    • Bright seafire runs about a plunging keel / On vehement nights : and where black danger lies, / Gleam the torn breakers. / But all days reveal / Drear dooms for me, nor any nights disguise / Their menace: […] 1895, Lionel Johnson, Poems, page 29:
    • Then it shallowed to two and the oars churned up seafire all about us. 1919 06, “Boys' Life”, in (Please provide the book title or journal name), page 54:
    • Vaiki hit with a resounding splash amid a burst of seafire that was rising and breaking in luminous stars all over the anchorage. […] the next incoming wave. It crest was charged with the same flaming sea-stars, so that a greenish flame was reflected in the stream of the backwash. 1923, J. Allan Dunn, “Wild Justice”, in Adventure, volume 39, page 75:
    • And when the moon goes down, lo, a wonder on the sea: the waves beat in flame upon the shore; it is fringed with phosphorescence of shifting hue, like acres of electric light. And that is […] that strange seafire we know as little as they who imagined a lake of fire and brimstone. 1894, Moncure Daniel Conway, Lessons for the day, discourses, volume 1, page 10:

Coordinates

milky sea · sea sparkle · waterburn · marfire · mareel

Relateds

sea firefly

Translations (7)

nn moreld (bioluminescent or biophosphorescent light seen in seawater) · da morild (bioluminescent or biophosphorescent light seen in seawater) · gl ardora (bioluminescent or biophosphorescent light seen in seawater) · de Meeresleuchten (bioluminescent or biophosphorescent light seen in seawater) · sv mareld (bioluminescent or biophosphorescent light seen in seawater) · nb morild (bioluminescent or biophosphorescent light seen in seawater) · gl ardentía (bioluminescent or biophosphorescent light seen in seawater)