Word of the Week (WOW): iridescent

This post is in response to Heena Rathore P.’s Word of the Week (WOW). This weekly meme is a great way of improving your vocabulary.  If you wish to participate, simply create a post with your word and leave a link in a comment on Heena’s WOW post.

Here’s my WOW for this week:

Word
iridescent

Part of Speech
Adjective

Noun – iridescence
Adverb – iridescently

Pronunciation
ir-i-des-cent (ĭr′ĭ-dĕs′ənt)

Meaning 
1) Displaying a spectrum of colours that shimmer and change due to interference and scattering as the observer’s position changes.
2) Brilliant, lustrous, or colorful in effect or appearance.

Synonyms
1) chatoyant, changeable, shot
2) lustrous, opalescent, opaline, pearlescent, pearly, polychromatic, prismatic, nacreous, shimmering

Word Origin
The derivation of the word iridescent is partly from the Greek word  îris (ἶρις) meaning ‘rainbow’, combined with the Latin suffix -escent, meaning ‘having a tendency toward’. The word iris in turn derives from the Greek goddess Iris, a messenger of the gods, who is the personification of the rainbow.

Use in a Sentence
1) The damselfly’s iridescent body shimmered as it flitted with deadly intent beside the stream.

2) Gleaming iridescently as the morning sunlight fell upon its surface, the abalone shell fascinated Martha’s grandchildren as it had their parents so many years earlier.

If you want to discover more great words then visit Heena’s page Word Treasure.

This is the first time I’ve actually managed to use one of my own pictures on a WOW post! As soon as I decided to do the word iridescent this week I just knew I’d have to include one of my damselfly pictures. I hope you like it – and the rest of the post as well, of course!