painted
Americanadjective
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reproduced or represented in paint.
a painted image.
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covered with a coating of paint.
a painted chair.
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unreal; artificial; feigned.
a painted life.
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exaggerated or misrepresented.
a luridly painted version of what really happened.
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covered with makeup, especially to excess.
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brightly colored or multicolored (used in combinations).
Other Word Forms
- unpainted adjective
- well-painted adjective
Etymology
Origin of painted
Middle English word dating back to 1250–1300; see origin at paint, -ed 2
Explanation
Anything that's painted is either covered or decorated with paint. Brightly painted walls can cheer up a room that would otherwise be dark and dull. Your colorfully painted kitchen chairs are coated with different shades of paint, and your painted fingernails might be dabbed with shiny silver nail polish. Several types of animals are also painted because they have bright or varied stripes of color on their bodies — like painted turtles' colorful shells and painted storks' bright feathers. Painted comes from paint and its Latin root, pingere, "to paint, embroider, or tattoo."
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Prosecutors painted the picture of a privileged woman who was driven by greed and status.
From The Wall Street Journal • Apr. 8, 2026
Summer Fields was painted around 1961 and captures the "dying sunset spilling across the corner of a Catterline field".
From BBC • Apr. 7, 2026
Steyer, who has a net worth of $2.4 billion according to Forbes, has painted himself as a reformed billionaire who walked away from Farallon because of angst about how he earned his fortune.
From Los Angeles Times • Apr. 6, 2026
Ortiz, who often painted Cynthia’s nails for her, knew immediately.
From Slate • Apr. 6, 2026
From this side of the building it was like everything, from the walls to the floors and everything in between, was painted in gold.
From "The Way to Rio Luna" by Zoraida Cordova
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
