moonlight – English noun declension

English noun forms of moonlight

Noun: moonlight
Singularmoonlight
Pluralmoonlights

Sample Sentences

  • Meronym: moonbeam
  • Than Ripheus him ſelf adioynd, & myghty moſt with launce / Came Iphitus onto my ſide, by monelight met by chaunce. [1555 July (date written; Gregorian calendar), Virgil, “The Seconde Booke”, in Thomas Phaer, transl., The Seuen First Bookes of the Eneidos of Virgill, Conuerted in Englishe Meter […], London: […] Ihon Kyngston, for Richard Jugge, […], published 7 June 1558 (Gregorian calendar), →OCLC, signature [D.iv.], verso:]
  • If you vvill patiently daunce in our Round, / And ſee our Moonelight Reuelles, goe vvith vs: / If not, ſhunne me, and I vvill ſpare your haunts. [c. 1595–1596 (date written), William Shakespeare, A Midsommer Nights Dreame. […] (First Quarto), London: […] [Richard Bradock] for Thomas Fisher, […], published 1600, →OCLC, [Act II, scene i], signature C, recto:]
  • Hovv ſvveete the Moone-light ſleeps vpon this banke, / Heere vvill vve ſit, and let the ſounds of muſicke / Creepe in our eares ſoft ſtillneſſe, and the night / Become the tutches of ſvveete harmony: […] [c. 1596–1598 (date written), W[illiam] Shakespeare, The Excellent History of the Merchant of Venice. […] (First Quarto), [London]: […] J[ames] Roberts [for Thomas Heyes], published 1600, →OCLC, [Act V, scene i], signature [I4], recto:]
  • The night comes on, vve, eager to purſue / The Combat ſtil, and they aſham'd to leave: / Till the laſt ſtreaks of dying day vvithdrevv, / And doubtful Moon-light did our rage deceive. [1667, John Dryden, Annus Mirabilis: The Year of Wonders, 1666. […], London: […] Henry Herringman, […], →OCLC, stanza 68, page 18:]
  • This choleric gentleman, vvho vvas a country ſquire, no ſooner ſavv his rival, than he began to brandiſh his cudgel in a menacing poſture, […] This attitude, and the ſight of the blade vvhich glittened by moonlight in his face, checked in ſome ſort, the ardour of his aſſailant, […] [1751, [Tobias] Smollett, “He Atchieves an Adventure at the Assembly, and Quarrels with His Governor”, in The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle […], volume I, London: Harrison and Co., […], →OCLC, page 204:]
  • 'Tis eight o’clock,—a clear March night, / The moon is up,—the sky is blue, / The owlet, in the moonlight air, / Shouts from nobody knows where; […] [1798, [William Wordsworth], “The Idiot Boy”, in Lyrical Ballads, with a Few Other Poems, London: […] J[ohn] & A[rthur] Arch, […], →OCLC, page 149:]
  • He found him in a little moonlight room, / Pale, lattic'd, chill, and silent as a tomb. [1819, John Keats, “The Eve of St. Agnes”, in Lamia, Isabella, the Eve of St. Agnes, and Other Poems, London: […] [Thomas Davison] for Taylor and Hessey, […], published 1820, →OCLC, stanza XIII, page 89:]
  • It was the pensive oysterman that saw a lovely maid, / Upon a moonlight evening, a-sitting in the shade; [1830, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Ballad of the Oysterman, lines 5–6:]
  • [S]he passed away noiselessly, and the moonlight kissed the wall which her shadow had dimmed. [1849, Currer Bell [pseudonym; Charlotte Brontë], “Further Communications on Business”, in Shirley. A Tale. […], volume II, London: Smith, Elder and Co., […], →OCLC, page 39:]
  • What say you, gentlemen, shall we have a moonlight hunt? [1889, Robert Louis Stevenson, “The Journey in the Wilderness (Continued)”, in The Master of Ballantrae. […], London; Paris: Cassell & Company, […], →OCLC, page 325:]
  • The windows were curtainless, and the yellow moonlight, flooding in through the diamond panes, enabled one to see even colours, whilst it softened the wealth of dust which lay over all and disguised in some measure the ravages of time and the moth. [1897, Bram Stoker, “Jonathan Harker’s Journal—continued”, in Dracula, New York, N.Y.: Modern Library, →OCLC, chapter III, page 39:]
  • They were still under the white-plum tree and their faces were touching except for a pale, thin ray of moonlight between. [1925, F[rancis] Scott Fitzgerald, chapter VI, in The Great Gatsby, New York, N.Y.: Charles Scribner’s Sons, →OCLC, page 129:]
  • It [the Arkenstone] was as if a globe had been filled with moonlight and hung before them in a net woven of the glint of frosty stars. [1937 September 21, J[ohn] R[onald] R[euel] Tolkien, “A Thief in the Night”, in The Hobbit: Or There and Back Again, revised edition, New York, N.Y.: Ballantine Books, published February 1966 (August 1967 printing), →OCLC, page 257:]
  • Let's go on a moonlight swim / Far away from the crowd / All alone upon the beach / Our lips and our arms / Close within each other's reach / We'll be on a moonlight swim [1957 July 29, “Moonlight Swim [77169X45; YW15609]”, Sylvia Dee (lyrics), Ben Weisman (music)performed by Nick Noble, [Chicago, Ill.]: Mercury Record Corporation, →OCLC:]
  • The night was very quiet. It was always quiet except on moonlight nights. Darkness held a vague terror for these people, even the bravest among them. […] On a moonlight night it would be different. The happy voices of children playing in open fields would then be heard. And perhaps those not so young would be playing in pairs in less open places, and old men and women would remember their youth. [1958 June 17, Chinua Achebe, chapter 2, in Things Fall Apart, New York, N.Y.: Astor-Honor, published 1959, →OCLC, part 1, page 11:]
  • Barter'd for game from chace or warren won, / Yon cask holds moonlight, run when moon was none; / And late-snatch'd spoils lie stow'd in hutch apart, / To wait the associate higgler's evening cart. [1809, [Walter Scott], “Fragments, which Originally Appeared in the Edinburgh Annual Register for 1809. The Poacher.”, in The Bridal of Triermain, or The Vale of St John. In Three Cantos, Edinburgh: […] James Ballantyne and Co. for John Ballantyne and Co. […]; London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown; and Gale, Curtis, and Fenner; […], published 1813, →OCLC, pages 225–226:]
  • A fast-sailing lugger will soon bring you there though, snug stowed under hatches, like a cask of moonlight. [1824 June, [Walter Scott], “Narrative of Darsie Latimer, Continued”, in Redgauntlet, […], volume III, Edinburgh: […] [James Ballantyne and Co.] for Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Hurst, Robinson, and Co., →OCLC, page 163:]

Etymology

1. Etymology tree
2. Proto-Indo-European *meh₁-?
3. Proto-Indo-European *mḗh₁n̥s
4. Proto-Germanic *mēnô
5. Proto-West Germanic *mānō
6. Old English mōna
7. Middle English mone
8. Proto-Indo-European *lewk-der.
9. Proto-Indo-European *lewk-to-s
10. Proto-Germanic *leuhtaz
11. Proto-West Germanic *leuht
12. Old English lēoht
13. Middle English light
14. Middle English moonelight
15. English moonlight
16. The noun is derived from Middle English moonelight, monelight, mone lyght (“light of the moon; (heraldry) pattern of moons on the field of a heraldic banner”), from mon, mone (“moon”) (from Old English mōna (“moon”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *mḗh₁n̥s (“moon; month”)) + light (“light”) (from Old English lēoht (“light”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *lewk- (“bright; to see; to shine”)). By surface analysis, moon + light.
17. The verb is derived from the noun. Verb sense 1.1 (“to secretly leave premises without paying the rent”) is a back-formation from moonlight flit, while verb sense 1.2 (“to make a night-time attack on a tenant farmer”) is probably a back-formation from moonlighter.
18. cognates
19. * Dutch maanlicht
20. * German Mondlicht
21. * Scots muinlicht, munelicht
22. * West Frisian moanneljocht See: Middle English Nouns 'moonelight,monelight,mone lyght', Old English Nouns 'mōna', Dutch Nouns 'maanlicht', German Nouns 'Mondlicht'.