yellow

adj

Etymology: From Middle English yelwe, yelou, from Old English ġeolwe, oblique form of Old English ġeolu, from Proto-West Germanic *gelu, from Proto-Germanic *gelwaz, from Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰelh₃wós, from *ǵʰelh₃- (“green, yellow”). Cognate with Scots yella (“yellow”), North Frisian gööl, güül (“yellow”), Saterland Frisian jeel (“yellow”), West Frisian giel (“yellow”), Cimbrian gel, ghéel (“yellow”), Dutch geel (“yellow”), Dutch Low Saxon gael, gel (“yellow”), German gelb, gehl (“yellow”), German Low German gel, geel, gęl, gäl (“yellow”), Luxembourgish giel (“yellow”), Vilamovian gaoł (“yellow”), Yiddish געל (gel), געלב (gelb, “yellow”), Danish, Norwegian Bokmål, Norwegian Nynorsk, and Swedish gul (“yellow”), Faroese and Icelandic gulur (“yellow”). Compare also Welsh gell (“bay, tawny”), Latin helvus (“dull yellow”), Irish geal (“white, bright”), Lithuanian žalias (“green”), Ancient Greek χλωρός (khlōrós, “light green”), Persian زرد (zard, “yellow”), Sanskrit हरि (hari, “greenish-yellow”), Russian жёлтый (žóltyj, “yellow”), Russian зелёный (zeljónyj, “green”). The verb is from Middle English yelwen, ȝalowen, ȝolewen, from Old English ġeolwian, from the adjective.

1. Of a yellow hue.

   “He had a yellow laptop in his bag.”

   “A sweaty reaper from his tillage brought / First fruits, the green ear and the yellow sheaf.”

2. Lacking courage.

   “What you should be is not yellow at all. If you're supposed to sock somebody in the jaw, and you sort of feel like doing it, you should do it.”

   “You yellow bastards! Come back here and take what's coming to you!”

3. Characterized by sensationalism, lurid content, and doubtful accuracy.

   “The denizens of the gossipy world of the pink press, purple prose and yellow tabloids are shivering over disputed photographs of Princess Caroline of Monaco.”

4. Of a hue attributed to Far East Asians, especially the Chinese.

   “They were all tall and all handsome, though they varied in their degree of darkness of skin, some being as dark as Mahomed, and some as yellow as a Chinese.”

5. Far East Asian (relating to Asian people).

   “Imagine that awful being, and you have a mental picture of Dr. Fu-Manchu, the yellow peril incarnate in one man.”

   “The two youths, the brown and the yellow, faced each other at the cross-roads, under a dim street-lamp.”

6. Of mixed Aboriginal and Caucasian ancestry.

   “"Eh, Oscar—you hear about your yeller nephew?".”

   “A big full-blood gin cottoned onto me. “Give us a drink, yeller feller.””

7. Synonym of high yellow.

   “Charley threw her over for a yellow gal named Nancy: he never forgave Vashti for the vanishing from his life of a menace that had come to mean more to him than Vashti herself.”

8. Related to the Liberal Democrats.

   “yellow constituencies”

9. Related to the Free Democratic Party, a political party in Germany.

   “the black–yellow coalition”

intj

Etymology: From the colors used on traffic lights; yellow being the one for warning vehicles to stop soon.

1. Used to indicate that the speaker needs a temporary break from current sexual activity.

name

1. A surname.

noun

Etymology: From Middle English yelwe, yelou, from Old English ġeolwe, oblique form of Old English ġeolu, from Proto-West Germanic *gelu, from Proto-Germanic *gelwaz, from Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰelh₃wós, from *ǵʰelh₃- (“green, yellow”). Cognate with Scots yella (“yellow”), North Frisian gööl, güül (“yellow”), Saterland Frisian jeel (“yellow”), West Frisian giel (“yellow”), Cimbrian gel, ghéel (“yellow”), Dutch geel (“yellow”), Dutch Low Saxon gael, gel (“yellow”), German gelb, gehl (“yellow”), German Low German gel, geel, gęl, gäl (“yellow”), Luxembourgish giel (“yellow”), Vilamovian gaoł (“yellow”), Yiddish געל (gel), געלב (gelb, “yellow”), Danish, Norwegian Bokmål, Norwegian Nynorsk, and Swedish gul (“yellow”), Faroese and Icelandic gulur (“yellow”). Compare also Welsh gell (“bay, tawny”), Latin helvus (“dull yellow”), Irish geal (“white, bright”), Lithuanian žalias (“green”), Ancient Greek χλωρός (khlōrós, “light green”), Persian زرد (zard, “yellow”), Sanskrit हरि (hari, “greenish-yellow”), Russian жёлтый (žóltyj, “yellow”), Russian зелёный (zeljónyj, “green”). The verb is from Middle English yelwen, ȝalowen, ȝolewen, from Old English ġeolwian, from the adjective.

1. The color of sunflower petals and lemons; the color obtained by mixing green and red light, or by subtracting blue from white light; the color evoked by light of wavelength around 580 nm; one of the three primary colors in subtractive color systems.

   “It is the strangest yellow, that wall-paper! It makes me think of all the yellow things I ever saw—not beautiful ones like buttercups, but old foul, bad yellow things.”

   “Red No. 3, red No. 40, blue No. 2 and green No. 3 all have been linked with cancer or tumors in animals. Other sources say red No. 40 and yellow No. 5 and No. 6 contain or may be contaminated with known carcinogens.”

2. The middle light in a set of three traffic lights, the lighting of which indicates that drivers should stop short of the intersection if it is safe to do so.
3. One of the color balls used in snooker, with a value of 2 points.
4. One of two groups of object balls, or a ball from that group, as used in the principally British version of pool that makes use of unnumbered balls (the yellow(s) and red(s)); contrast stripes and solids in the originally American version with numbered balls).
5. A yellow card.

   “Andrew Surman fired in what proved to be a 37th-minute winner before Forest's Paul Konchesky saw red late on. That second yellow for the loan signing came in stoppage time and did not affect the outcome of a game which Norwich dominated.”

6. Any of various pierid butterflies of the subfamily Coliadinae, especially the yellow colored species. Compare sulphur.

   “Several other beautiful butterflies rewarded my search in this place [...] The most abundant butterflies were the whites and yellows (Pieridae), several of which I had already found at Lombock and at Coupang, while others were new to me.”

verb

Etymology: From Middle English yelwe, yelou, from Old English ġeolwe, oblique form of Old English ġeolu, from Proto-West Germanic *gelu, from Proto-Germanic *gelwaz, from Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰelh₃wós, from *ǵʰelh₃- (“green, yellow”). Cognate with Scots yella (“yellow”), North Frisian gööl, güül (“yellow”), Saterland Frisian jeel (“yellow”), West Frisian giel (“yellow”), Cimbrian gel, ghéel (“yellow”), Dutch geel (“yellow”), Dutch Low Saxon gael, gel (“yellow”), German gelb, gehl (“yellow”), German Low German gel, geel, gęl, gäl (“yellow”), Luxembourgish giel (“yellow”), Vilamovian gaoł (“yellow”), Yiddish געל (gel), געלב (gelb, “yellow”), Danish, Norwegian Bokmål, Norwegian Nynorsk, and Swedish gul (“yellow”), Faroese and Icelandic gulur (“yellow”). Compare also Welsh gell (“bay, tawny”), Latin helvus (“dull yellow”), Irish geal (“white, bright”), Lithuanian žalias (“green”), Ancient Greek χλωρός (khlōrós, “light green”), Persian زرد (zard, “yellow”), Sanskrit हरि (hari, “greenish-yellow”), Russian жёлтый (žóltyj, “yellow”), Russian зелёный (zeljónyj, “green”). The verb is from Middle English yelwen, ȝalowen, ȝolewen, from Old English ġeolwian, from the adjective.

1. To become yellow or yellower.

   “Then suddenly, with the least warning, the sky yellows and the Chergui blows in from the Sahara, stinging the eyes and choking with its sandy, sticky breath.”

   “Interviews, clippings, yellowing stories from foreign newspapers, notebooks with old scribblings. Salisbury called it the debris of a reporter always too much on the run to sort out the paper, but there it was, an investigator's dream, […]”

2. To make (something) yellow or yellower.
3. To promote (a captain) to flag rank without command of a squadron, ending his career; to make him a yellow admiral.

   “Then they might yellow him if they wanted to; he would be satisfied with Admiral’s rank.”