amaranthine

plural amaranthines · alternative amarantine

1. countableuncountableA dark reddish-purple colour.

   The giantesses lift arms like the trunks of sycamores, each finger tipped with an amaranthine talon.

   1981, Gene Wolfe, chapter VIII, in The Claw of the Conciliator (The Book of the New Sun; 2), New York: Timescape, →ISBN, page 72

2. countableuncountableThe amaranth flower.

   Ah! when the eternal morning dawns, And amaranthines shall displace the thorns […]

   1857, Eleanor Duckworth, Milly Wentworth, Poems and Sketches, page 65

comparative more amaranthine · superlative most amaranthine · alternative amarantine

1. Of a dark reddish purple colour.
2. Unfading, eternal, immortal, infinite.

   Ah! is Thy love indeed A weed, albeit an amaranthine weed, Suffering no flowers except its own to mount?

   1893, Francis Thompson, The Hound of Heaven

   2 more examples

   […] The angelick blast Filled all the regions: from their blisful bowers Of amarantine shade, fountain or spring, By the waters of life, where’er they sat In fellowships of joy, the sons of light Hasted, resorting to the summons high

   1667, John Milton, “Book XI”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC

   “Fuchsia,” said the Doctor, “come along this evening and I’ll give you a tonic which you must make her take every day. By all that’s amaranthine you really must. […]”

   1946, Mervyn Peake, Titus Groan, London: Eyre & Spottiswoode

3. Relating to the mythical amaranth flower that never fades.
4. Relating to, or having the form of plants of the genus Amaranthus.