hue

[hyoo or, often, yoo]

SEE MORE SYNONYMS FOR hue ON THESAURUS.COM

noun

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 hue

before 900; Middle English hewe, Old English hīw form, appearance, color; cognate with Old Norse hȳ bird's down, Swedish hy skin, complexion, Gothic hiwi form, appearance; akin to Old English hār gray (see hoar)

Related formshue·less, adjective

Can be confusedhew hue Hugh

hue

[hyoo]

noun

outcry, as of pursuers; clamor.

Origin of hue

1200–50; Middle English hu(e) < Middle French: a hoot, outcry (whence huer to hoot, cry out)

Hué

[hwey]

noun

a seaport in central Vietnam: former capital of Annam.

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2019

Related Words for hue

tinge, tint, tone, complexion, tincture, value, cast, aspect, dye, chroma

Examples from the Web for hue

Contemporary Examples of hue

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.
Tangled Up in Blue: Young Stars and Their Blue Rinses
Erin Cunningham
July 9, 2014
This was a madcap game, the ball hurtling from end to end, chased by tired legs of every hue.
Stars and Stripes 2, Black Stars 1: Team USA Takes a Win From Ghana
Tunku Varadarajan
June 17, 2014
Does Blackness, as a social color, change the hue of all the other colors it touches?
Abstraction Colored by Race
Blake Gopnik
January 31, 2014
Sam Gilliam works with form and hue, but we always see history in it.
Abstraction Colored by Race
Blake Gopnik
January 31, 2014
The walls are painted a solemn Bordeaux hue to let the garments resonate all the more boldly.
Azzedine Alaïa Retrospective Opens at Palais Galliera in Paris
Sarah Moroz
September 27, 2013

Historical Examples of hue

For, if he could get shelter for three days, the hue and cry would subside.
Way of the Lawless
Max 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, Complete
Emile Zola
The lamplight imparted the hue of yellow wax to their pale faces.
The Fortune of the Rougons
Emile Zola
His face was smooth, full and florid, the hue rather suggestive.
Personal Recollections of a Cavalryman
J. H. (James Harvey) Kidd

British Dictionary definitions for hue

hue

noun

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 for hue

Old English hīw beauty; related to Old Norse hӯ fine hair, Gothic hiwi form

Hué

noun

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)

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

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 in Science

hue

[hyōō]

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.