hue1
- a gradation or variety of a color; tint: pale hues.
- the property of light by which the color of an object is classified as red, blue, green, or yellow in reference to the spectrum.
- color: all the hues of the rainbow.
- form or appearance.
- complexion.
Origin of hue1
hue2
- outcry, as of pursuers; clamor.
Origin of hue2
Hué
- a seaport in central Vietnam: former capital of Annam.
Examples from the Web for hue
Contemporary Examples
Her pin-up curls may have been envy-worthy, but it was the bleach blond, almost snow white, hue of her hair that become iconic.
This was a madcap game, the ball hurtling from end to end, chased by tired legs of every hue.
Does Blackness, as a social color, change the hue of all the other colors it touches?
Sam Gilliam works with form and hue, but we always see history in it.
The walls are painted a solemn Bordeaux hue to let the garments resonate all the more boldly.
Historical Examples
For, if he could get shelter for three days, the hue and cry would subside.
Way of the LawlessMax Brand
Not that mine is altogether a chameleon spirit, with no hue of its own.
Beneath an Umbrella (From "Twice Told Tales")Nathaniel Hawthorne
The entire place, indeed, was corroded, tinged with the hue of old gold.
The Three Cities Trilogy, CompleteEmile Zola
The lamplight imparted the hue of yellow wax to their pale faces.
The Fortune of the RougonsEmile Zola
His face was smooth, full and florid, the hue rather suggestive.
Personal Recollections of a CavalrymanJ. H. (James Harvey) Kidd
hue
- the attribute of colour that enables an observer to classify it as red, green, blue, purple, etc, and excludes white, black, and shades of greySee also colour
- a shade of a colour
- aspect; complexiona different hue on matters
Word Origin
Hué
- a port in central Vietnam, on the delta of the Hué River near the South China Sea: former capital of the kingdom of Annam, of French Indochina (1883–1946), and of Central Vietnam (1946–54). Pop: 377 000 (2005 est)
Word Origin and History for hue
n.1
"color," Old English hiw "color, form, appearance, beauty," earlier heow, hiow, from Proto-Germanic *hiwam (cf. Old Norse hy "bird's down," Swedish hy "skin, complexion," Gothic hiwi "form, appearance"), from PIE *kei-, a color adjective of broad application (cf. Sanskrit chawi "hide, skin, complexion, color, beauty, splendor," Lithuanian šyvas "white"). A common word in Old English, squeezed into obscurity after c.1600 by color, but revived 1850s in chemistry and chromatography.
n.2
"a shouting," mid-13c., from Old French hue "outcry, noise, war or hunting cry," probably of imitative origin. Hue and cry is late 13c. as an Anglo-French legal term meaning "outcry calling for pursuit of a felon." Extended sense of "cry of alarm" is 1580s.
hue
- The property of colors by which they are seen as ranging from red through orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet, as determined by the dominant wavelength of the light. Compare saturation value.