Yellowish

How to spell yellowish

9 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce yellowish

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does yellowish mean?

1. adjectiveHaving a tinge of yellow; somewhat yellow in colour.

Yellowish in a sentence

• The old paper had turned a faint yellowish shade over the years.

• A yellowish glow filled the room as the lamp warmed up.

Where does yellowish come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This word is built from the colour term 'yellow', which descends directly from the Old English geolu, meaning the colour of gold, butter, or ripe corn. That word goes back to the same ancient Germanic root that also gave us 'gold' and the Latin 'helvus' (a dull yellow), all tracing to a prehistoric root meaning 'to gleam' or 'to shine'. The suffix '-ish' is an equally old English ending used to soften or approximate an adjective, so 'yellowish' literally means 'somewhat yellow' rather than fully yellow. The same '-ish' pattern appears across the colour words 'reddish', 'greenish', and 'bluish', and adults sometimes hesitate over whether 'yellow' keeps both its w and its o before the suffix; it does, since '-ish' simply attaches to the whole base word. The construction has been current in English for centuries and remains the standard way to describe a faint or impure tinge of yellow.

How the word is built

• yellow (Old English geolu: yellow)
• -ish (adjective suffix meaning 'somewhat' or 'resembling')