onyx - Wiktionary, the free dictionary (original) (raw)

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary

From Middle English onix (c. 1300), earlier oniche (c. 1250), from Old French oniche or onix, from Latin onyx, from Ancient Greek ὄνυξ (ónux, “onyx”).[1] Doublet of unguis.

onyx (countable and uncountable, plural onyxes)

  1. (mineralogy) A banded variety of chalcedony, a cryptocrystalline form of quartz.
    • 2023 September 23, Tom Robbins, “Suite dreams”, in FT Weekend (Life & Arts section), London: The Financial Times Ltd., →ISSN, →OCLC, page 1:
      People talk about using marble in the bathrooms. Marble wasn't good enough for use—we have onyx!
  2. A jet-black color, named after the gemstone.
    onyx:
    Near-synonyms: ebony, raven
  3. Any of various lycaenid butterflies of the genus Horaga.

Black banded onyx

a banded variety of chalcedony

onyx (not comparable)

  1. Jet-black; often, glossily so.
    Near-synonyms: ebony, raven
    • , Genesis, 2:12
      And the gold of that land is good: there is bdellium and the onyx stone.
    • 1922, Michael Arlen, “3/7/2”, in “Piracy”: A Romantic Chronicle of These Days‎[1]:
      There was no moon, only stars set brilliantly in the soft black onyx of the sky : a black night and very silent on Cimiez ; and a black and silent prospect from the verandah […]
  1. ^ Chambers Dictionary of Etymology, Robert K. Barnhart (ed.), Chambers, 1988

From Ancient Greek ὄνῠξ (ónŭx, “nail”).

onyx m (genitive onychis or onychos); third declension

  1. onyx (yellow marble)
  2. a yellowish precious stone
  3. the female of a mussel of the scallop species

Third-declension noun (non-Greek-type or Greek-type, normal variant).

onyx

  1. alternative form of oniche

onyx m (invariable)

  1. pre-reform spelling (used until 1943 in Brazil and 1911 in Portugal) of ónix