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Bleach
Definitions
- 1 Pale; bleak. archaic
- 1 A chemical, such as sodium hypochlorite or hydrogen peroxide, or a preparation of such a chemical, used for disinfecting or whitening. uncountable
- 2 An act of bleaching; exposure to the sun.
- 3 A disease of the skin characterized by hypopigmentation and itching, believed in the 17th century to be a form of leprosy. obsolete
- 4 the act of whitening something by bleaching it (exposing it to sunlight or using a chemical bleaching agent) wordnet
- 5 A variety of bleach. countable
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- 6 the whiteness that results from removing the color from something wordnet
- 7 an agent that makes things white or colorless wordnet
- 1 To treat with bleach, especially so as to whiten (fabric, paper, etc.) or lighten (hair). transitive
"Candifacio, to make whyte, to bleache, to make to glowe lyke a burnyng cole."
- 2 make whiter or lighter wordnet
- 3 To be whitened or lightened (by the sun, for example). intransitive
"The white sheet bleaching on the hedge, With heigh! the sweet birds, O, how they sing!"
- 4 cause to become white or lighter in color wordnet
- 5 To lose color due to stress-induced expulsion of symbiotic unicellular algae. intransitive
"Once coral bleaching begins, corals tend to continue to bleach even if the stressor is removed."
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- 6 To make meaningless; to divest of meaning; to make empty. figuratively, transitive
"semantically bleached words that have become illocutionary particles"
Etymology
From Middle English blechen, from Old English blǣċan (“to bleach, whiten”), from Proto-West Germanic *blaikijan, from Proto-Germanic *blaikijaną, from Proto-Indo-European *bʰel- (“to shine”). Cognate with Dutch bleken (“to bleach”), German bleichen (“to bleach”), Danish blege, Swedish bleka (“to bleach”). Related to Old English blāc (“pale”) (English blake; compare also bleak).
From Middle English blechen, from Old English blǣċan (“to bleach, whiten”), from Proto-West Germanic *blaikijan, from Proto-Germanic *blaikijaną, from Proto-Indo-European *bʰel- (“to shine”). Cognate with Dutch bleken (“to bleach”), German bleichen (“to bleach”), Danish blege, Swedish bleka (“to bleach”). Related to Old English blāc (“pale”) (English blake; compare also bleak).
From Middle English bleche, from Old English blǣċu, blǣċo (“paleness, pallor”), from Proto-Germanic *blaikį̄ (“paleness”). See Etymology 1 above.
From Middle English bleche (also bleke), from Old English blǣċ, blǣc, variants of blāc (“bright, shining, glittering”), from Proto-West Germanic *blaik, from Proto-Germanic *blaikaz (“pale, shining”). More at bleak.
From Middle English bleche, from Old English blǣċe (“irritation of the skin, leprosy; psoriasis”).
See also for "bleach"
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