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Adorn   /ədˈɔrn/   Listen
verb
Adorn  v. t.  (past & past part. adorned; pres. part. adorning)  To deck or dress with ornaments; to embellish; to set off to advantage; to render pleasing or attractive. "As a bride adorneth herself with her jewels." "At church, with meek and unaffected grace, His looks adorned the venerable place."
Synonyms: To deck; decorate; embellish; ornament; beautify; grace; dignify; exalt; honor. To Adorn, Ornament, Decorate, Embellish. We decorate and ornament by putting on some adjunct which is attractive or beautiful, and which serves to heighten the general effect. Thus, a lady's head-dress may be ornament or decorated with flowers or jewelry; a hall may be decorated or ornament with carving or gilding, with wreaths of flowers, or with hangings. Ornament is used in a wider sense than decorate. To embellish is to beautify or ornament richly, not so much by mere additions or details as by modifying the thing itself as a whole. It sometimes means gaudy and artificial decoration. We embellish a book with rich engravings; a style is embellished with rich and beautiful imagery; a shopkeeper embellishes his front window to attract attention. Adorn is sometimes identical with decorate, as when we say, a lady was adorned with jewels. In other cases, it seems to imply something more. Thus, we speak of a gallery of paintings as adorned with the works of some of the great masters, or adorned with noble statuary and columns. Here decorated and ornamented would hardly be appropriate. There is a value in these works of genius beyond mere show and ornament. Adorn may be used of what is purely moral; as, a character adorned with every Christian grace. Here neither decorate, nor ornament, nor embellish is proper.



noun
Adorn  n.  Adornment. (Obs.)



adjective
Adorn  adj.  Adorned; decorated. (Obs.)






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Adorn" Quotes from Famous Books



... text. Colonel Hutchinson was a doctrinal Puritan, and one of the regicides. In himself we behold all the elements of a great and noble character, devout, humane, scrupulously conscientious, and of heroic courage; every quality that might adorn the gentleman, the patriot, the Christian. But his extreme principles induced a mistaken sense of duty, which embittered his own days, and added to the calamities of his country; after having been spared at the restoration, his gloomy reserve and supposed ...
— On Calvinism • William Hull

... gentleman. In his milder and softer moments he occasionally lays down his neckcloth, and pens stanzas, which sometimes find their way into a Lady's Magazine, or the 'Poets' Corner' of some country newspaper; or which, in default of either vent for his genius, adorn the rainbow leaves of a lady's album. These are generally written upon some such occasions as contemplating the Bank of England by midnight, or beholding Saint Paul's in a snow-storm; and when these gloomy ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens

... glitter which characterises the mansions of the present Ghorka chiefs in the modern capital! Here the carving is more rich, the ornaments more massive, the houses themselves are more lofty and capacious. Sometimes two or three elaborately-carved balconies adorn the sombre but not less imposing exterior; from the projecting eaves wooden tassels, forming a sort of fringe, swing to and fro over ...
— A Journey to Katmandu • Laurence Oliphant

... in my station here Thee in Thy word may ever fear, So guide what things concern me, That found in me True faith may be, And may with truth adorn me. ...
— Paul Gerhardt's Spiritual Songs - Translated by John Kelly • Paul Gerhardt

... might be inscribed on a lasting leather medal and adorn the walls of the War Department, that it might act as an incentive to some future occupant of that lofty station! I advise the use of leather, because if we used any metal it might convey to our minds the idea of 'a sounding brass or ...
— Henry Ossian Flipper, The Colored Cadet at West Point • Henry Ossian Flipper


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