Link Centre Dictionary

sparkle

UK/ˈspɑː.kəl/ US/ˈspɑɹ.kəl/ fairly common

noun

1.

brightness and animation of countenance

  • “he had a sparkle in his eye”
Synonyms
2.

verb

1.

reflect brightly

  • “Unquarried marble sparkled on the hillside”
2.

be lively or brilliant or exhibit virtuosity

  • “The musical performance sparkled”
  • “A scintillating conversation”
  • “his playing coruscated throughout the concert hall”
3.

emit or produce sparks

  • “A high tension wire, brought down by a storm, can continue to spark”
Synonyms
4.

form bubbles

  • “The boiling soup was frothing”
  • “The river was foaming”
  • “Sparkling water”

Origin

From Middle English sparklen, sperclen, equivalent to spark + -le (frequentative verb). Cognate with West Frisian sparkelje (“to sparkle”), Dutch sparkelen (“to sparkle”).

Phrases

  • sea sparkle
  • sparkle up
  • sparkling water

Related words

Narrower terms

WordNet 2.1 (Princeton University). Wiktionary (CC BY-SA). CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. WordNet 2.1 Copyright Princeton University. All rights reserved. Wiktionary content is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike Licence.