Pronunciations
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/ˈlʌstɚ/
Pronunciation notes
- General-American
Noun
The ability or condition of shining with reflected light; sheen, gleam, gloss, sparkle, shine, etc.
Usage- US usage
- Countable
- Uncountable
- Examples
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metallic luster
pearly luster
More examples (6)
the diamond’s luster
And over all the fields themselves did muster, With bils and glayves making a dreadfull luster; That forst at first those knights backe to retyre: As when the wrathfull Boreas doth bluster, Nought may abide the tempest of his yre, Both man and beast doe fly, and succour doe inquyre.
First Servant: O, I am slain! My lord, you have one eye left To see some mischief on him. O! [Dies] Cornwall: Lest it see more, prevent it. Out, vile jelly! Where is thy lustre now? Gloucester: All dark and comfortless.
Daughters of Beulah! Muses who inspire the Poet’s Song! Record the journey of immortal Milton through your realms Of terror & mild moony lustre, in soft sexual delusions Of varied beauty, to delight the wanderer and repose His burning thirst & freezing hunger! […]
The canopy above the bed was a mosaic of tiny stones, jet, serpentine, dark hyacinth, black marble, bloodstone, and lapis lazuli, so confounded in a maze of altering hue and lustre that they might mock the palpitating sky of night.
2001, James Wood, Introduction to Saul Bellow, Collected Stories, New York: Viking, p. xvii, Curiously enough, the stream of consciousness, for all its reputation as the great accelerator of description, actually slows down realism, asks it to dawdle over tiny remembrances, tiny details and lusters, to circle and return.
The ability or condition of shining with reflected light; sheen, gleam, gloss, sparkle, shine, etc. The way in which the surface of any particular type of mineral reflects light differently from other minerals, which is helpful in telling minerals apart.
Usage- US usage
- Countable
- Uncountable
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More examples (1)
By the luster or glance of a mineral is meant the quantity and quality of light reflected by it, as determined by the character or minute structure of its surface. […] The two principal kinds of luster are the metallic and non-metallic. […] The adamantine luster is intermediate between the metallic and non-metallic lusters. […] The vitreous is the luster of glass, and of all minerals similar to glass in appearance, such as quartz, calcite, etc. The resinous luster is seen in resins, of which the native mineral copalite is an example; it is also well exhibited in sulphur and sphalerite. The pearly luster, i.e., the luster of pearl, is well shown only in minerals having a foliated or scaly structure, in other words, very perfect cleavage in one direction, such as talc, mica, and gypsum. The silky or satiny luster, like the pearly, is determined by the structure, being observed only in finely fibrous minerals. […] The greasy and waxy lusters are most common in certain amorphous minerals, such as serpentine.
Shining light from within, luminosity, brightness, shine.
Usage- US usage
- Countable
- Figurative
- Uncountable
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the sun’s luster
the luster of the minor stars
More examples (2)
[…] abashed the devil stood, And felt how awful goodness is, and saw Virtue in her shape how lovely, saw, and pined His loss; but chiefly to find here observed His lustre visibly impaired; yet seemed Undaunted. […]
1717, Joseph Addison, Metamorphoses Book III, The Story of Cadmus, The scorching sun was mounted high, / In all its lustre, to the noonday sky.
Shining beauty, splendor, attractiveness or attraction.
Usage- US usage
- Countable
- Figurative
- Uncountable
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How does the Luſtre of our Father’s Actions, Through the dark Cloud of Ills that cover him, Break out, and burn with more triumphant Brightneſs!
After so many years in the same field, the job had lost its luster.
More examples (3)
When Autumn's yellow lustre gilds the world...
Thus err the many, who, entranced to find Unwonted lustre in some clearer mind, Believe that Genius sets the laws at naught Which chain the pinions of our wildest thought;
1970, S.Y. Agnon, "Agunot" in Twenty-One Stories, New York: Schocken Books, p. 30, Their days of rest are wrested from them, their feasts are fasts, their lot is dust instead of luster.
Shining fame, renown, glory.
Usage- US usage
- Countable
- Figurative
- Uncountable
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After the scandal, the idol lost his luster and could only get work in Vegas.
More examples (3)
[…] whose ancestors, says Clarendon, had been transported out of Normandy with the Conqueror, "and had continued," says Sir Henry Wotton, "about the space of four hundred years, rather without obscurity than with any great lustre […]".
But Main, High, and Central have no past; rather, their past is now. It is not the fault of the inhabitants that nothing has gone before them. Nor are they to be condemned if they make their spinal streets conspicuous, and confer egregious lustre and false acclaim on Central, High, or Main, and erect minarets and marquees indeed as though their city were already in dream and fable.
The notion of two homosexuals living together more or less openly did not sit well with their neighbors, or even their friends, but Millthorpe took on a kind of symbolic luster as a kind of homosexual paradise.
Where else then, Denmark? Its misgivings about immigration have smudged some of the liberal lustre it once had.
Polish, social refinement.
Usage- US usage
- Countable
- Figurative
- Uncountable
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Sure, the posh git spoke with fine lustre. ’S all a load of bollocks, though, innit?
A thing exhibiting luster, particularly Any shining body or thing.
Usage- US usage
- Countable
- Literary
- Uncountable
A thing exhibiting luster, particularly A piece of glass added to a light (especially a chandelier) to increase its luster.
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- Uncountable
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More examples (1)
Each mortal has his pleasure: none deny Scarsdale his bottle, Darty his ham-pie; Ridotta sips and dances, till she see The doubling lustres dance as fast as she;
A thing exhibiting luster, particularly An ornamental light providing luster, especially a chandelier.
Usage- US usage
- Countable
- Uncountable
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The immense room was carpeted, the walls were covered with eighteenth-century panelling, and three electric lustres hung from the ceiling.
A thing exhibiting luster, particularly A substance that imparts luster to a surface, such as polish, gloss, plumbago, glaze, etc.
Usage- US usage
- Countable
- Uncountable
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More examples (2)
Gabriel coloured as if he felt he had made a mistake and, without looking at her, kicked off his goloshes and flicked actively with his muffler at his patent-leather shoes. […] When he had flicked lustre into his shoes he stood up and pulled his waistcoat down more tightly on his plump body.
Chinese themes are equally recognisable in the star-shaped and hexagonal tiles with either moulded relief or lustre-painted decoration, sometimes surrounded by an inscription border […]
A thing exhibiting luster, particularly The layer of an object that imparts luster, chiefly with regard to ceramics.
Usage- US usage
- Countable
- Uncountable
A thing exhibiting luster, particularly A kind of lustrous fabric with a wool weft and cotton, linen, or silk warp, chiefly used for women's dresses.
Usage- US usage
- Countable
- Uncountable
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Mrs. McLash was dressed for travelling. She wore a black lustre skirt that just exposed her broken button-boots […]
A thing exhibiting luster, particularly A glory, an act or thing that imparts fame or renown.
Usage- US usage
- Countable
- Obsolete
- Uncountable
Verb
To have luster, to gleam, to shine.
Usage- US usage
- Archaic
- Intransitive
- Examples
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What bloom, what brightness lusters o’er her cheeks!
To gain luster, to become lustrous.
Usage- US usage
- Archaic
- Intransitive
To give luster, particularly To make illustrious or attractive, to distinguish.
Usage- US usage
- Obsolete
- Transitive
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Our Puritans have from hence learned to colour and lustre their ugly Treasons... with the cloake of Religion.
To give luster, particularly To coat with a lustrous material or glaze, to impart physical luster to an object.
Usage- US usage
- Transitive
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More examples (1)
Peter and Mania found a pensione whose view was of chestnut woods and a horizon looped by peaks lustred with last winter’s snow, distant in time as well as space.
To shed light on, to illustrate, to show.
Usage- US usage
- Obsolete
- Transitive
Synonym of lustrate, particularly Synonym of purify, to ritually cleanse or renew.
Usage- US usage
- Obsolete
- Transitive
Synonym of lustrate, particularly Synonym of look, to look over, to survey.
Usage- US usage
- Obsolete
- Transitive
Noun
One who lusts, one inflamed with lust.
Usage- US usage
- Archaic
- Examples
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Eumenides But did neuer any Louers come hether?
...a luster after power...
More examples (1)
1867–1872, Ante-Nicene Christian Library, Testimonies against the Jews Neither fornicators, nor those who serve idols, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor the lusters after mankind […] shall obtain the kingdom of God.
Noun
Synonym of den: a dwelling-place in a wilderness, especially for animals.
Usage- US usage
- Obsolete
- Examples
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...But, turning to his luster, Calues and Dam, He shewes abhorr'd death, in his angers flame...
Noun
a quality that outshines the usual
- Broader terms
the visual property of something that shines with reflected light
- Broader terms
a surface coating for ceramics or porcelain
- Synonyms
- Broader terms