What does "cold" mean?
Cold: Lacking the sensation of warmth; suffering from the absence of heat; chilly; shivering; as, to be cold.
Additional senses
- 2.Not pungent or acrid. "Cold plants." Bacon 4. Wanting in ardor, intensity, warmth, zeal, or passion; spiritless; unconcerned; reserved. A cold and unconcerned spectator. T. Burnet. No cold relation is a zealous citizen. Burke.
- 3.Unwelcome; disagreeable; unsatisfactory. "Cold news for me." "Cold comfort." Shak.
- 4.Wanting in power to excite; dull; uninteresting. What a deal of cold business doth a man misspend the better part of life in! B. Jonson. The jest grows cold . . . when in comes on in a second scene. Addison.
- 5.Affecting the sense of smell (as of hunting dogs) but feebly; having lost its odor; as, a cold scent.
- 6.Not sensitive; not acute. Smell this business with a sense as cold As is a dead man's nose. Shak.
- 7.Distant; -- said, in the game of hunting for some object, of a seeker remote from the thing concealed.
- 8.(Paint.) Having a bluish effect. Cf. Warm, 8. Cold abscess. See under Abscess. -- Cold blast See under Blast, n., 2. Cold blood. See under Blood, n., 8. -- Cold chill, an ague fit. Wright. -- Cold chisel, a chisel of peculiar strength and hardness, for cutting cold metal. Weale. -- Cold cream. See under Cream. -- Cold slaw. See Cole slaw. -- In cold blood, without excitement or passion; deliberately. He was slain in cold blood after thefight was over. Sir W. Scott. To give one the cold shoulder, to treat one with neglect.
- 9.The relative absence of heat or warmth.
- 10.The sensation produced by the escape of heat; chilliness or chillness. When she saw her lord prepared to part, A deadly cold ran shivering to her heart. Dryden.
- 11.(Med.) A morbid state of the animal system produced by exposure to cold or dampness; a catarrh. Cold sore (Med.), a vesicular eruption appearing about the mouth as the result of a cold, or in the course of any disease attended with fever. -- To leave one out in the cold, to overlook or neglect him. [Colloq.] Cold, v. i. To become cold. [Obs.] Chaucer.
Sources
- Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913 edition (public domain, via GCIDE / Project Gutenberg).
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- Published: 2026-07-17T00:00:00-07:00 · Modified: 2026-07-17T00:00:00-07:00