coruscation

English

Alternative forms

• corruscation (dated)

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin coruscātiōnem, coruscātiō (“glitter, flash”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˌkɒɹəsˈkeɪʃən/
• Rhymes: -eɪʃən

Noun

coruscation (countable and uncountable, plural coruscations)

1. A sudden display of brilliance; a flashing of light; a sparkle.
   • 1837, Thomas Carlyle, The French Revolution: A History […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), London: Chapman and Hall, →OCLC, (please specify the book or page number):

     [I]n the dusky galleries, duskier with unwashed heads, is a strange 'coruscation,'—of impromptu billhooks.

   • 1838, [Letitia Elizabeth] Landon (indicated as editor), chapter VII, in Duty and Inclination: […], volume II, London: Henry Colburn, […], →OCLC, page 85:

     The one, as a brilliant coruscation playing in a summer sky, might enchant the fancy and ensure the suffrage of a moment; the other, as a lovely constellation, though less vivid, yet from its undeviating steadfastness never failed to leave upon the observer impressions more truly gratifying, solid, and lasting.

   • 2001, Oliver Sacks, Uncle Tungsten: Memories of a Chemical Boyhood, Alfred A. Knopf (2001), 6,

     All of these things—the rubbed amber, the magnets, the crystal radio, the clock dials with their tireless coruscations—gave me a sense of invisible rays and forces, a sense that beneath the familiar, visible world of colors and appearances there lay a dark, hidden world of mysterious laws and phenomena.

Related terms

• coruscate

Translations

sudden display of brilliance

• Bulgarian: блясък (bg) (bljasǎk), искрене (bg) (iskrene)
• French: coruscation (fr) f, fulgurance (fr) f
• German: Aufblitzen n, Blitzen (de) n, Funkeln (de) n
• Hungarian: felvillanás (hu), felcsillanás (hu), fellobbanás (hu), fellángolás (hu)
• Italian: corruscazione (it) f
• Portuguese: coruscação f

Further reading

• Douglas Harper (2001–2025) “coruscation”, in Online Etymology Dictionary.