aureole means A circle of light or halo around the head of a deity or a saint.
aureole is pronounced /ˈɔː.ɹiː.əʊl/.
Why “aureole” is a great word
A luminous ring of radiance, especially one shown encircling the head or form of a sacred personage, or any such halo of light around an object. Its lineage is one of gilded light, from Middle English aureole, from Old French aureole, from Medieval Latin aureola (corona) (“golden (crown)”), the feminine of Latin aureolus (“golden”), a diminutive of aureus (“of gold”). Unlike a 'halo,' which typically fixes a precise disc to the head, or a 'corona,' which belongs to the fierce plasma of a star, an aureole suggests a more diffuse, encompassing effulgence—a nimbus that might fill an entire sky. It is the gold leaf crackling behind a Byzantine Madonna, the sudden ring of light around the moon through thin cirrus clouds, or the warm, burnished glow that lingers on the fingertips after holding a glass lantern too close; it is the human longing to mark what is precious by drawing a luminous boundary around it, as if light itself could be held like a bowl.
Etymology
From Middle English aureole, from Old French aureole, from Medieval Latin aureola (corona) (“golden (crown)”). Doublet of oriole.
noun
- A circle of light or halo around the head of a deity or a saint.“The lady's hair no woman could possess without feeling it her pride. It was the daily theme of her lady's-maid,—a natural aureole to her head.”
- Any luminous or colored ring that encircles something.“It was a lean Jewish face, with a great fuzzy aureole of white hair and a small goatee beard […]”
- A corona.
- A ring around an igneous intrusion.“Cleavage and folds are imprinted are overprinted by the contact metamorphic aureole, indicating that they belong to a pre-intrustive episode of rock deformation and accompanying regional deformation.”
verb
- To surround with, or as if with, a halo.
Words closest in meaning
By meaning, not spelling — each word's AI semantic fingerprint, nearest first.