Etymologically
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sunrise

This is the current revision of this entry, as edited by bogdan on 22 October 2026 at 21:17. This address is a permanent link to this version.
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Pronunciation

  • US: /ˈsʌnɹaɪz/[1]

Etymology

It is from English sun + rise.[2][3] The OED takes the second part as the noun, Etymonline as the verb.[2][3] Merriam-Webster, the Shorter Oxford and Etymonline think it grew out of Middle English clauses such as "before the sun rise", in which rise is the verb in the subjunctive,[4][5][3] and the OED allows that such clauses may have been partly reanalysed as a noun.[2] The older words were sunrising, from the mid-13th century, and sunrist, from the mid-14th.[3][6]

Earliest recorded meaning

The time in the morning when the sun appears above the horizon: about 1400, in a copy of Chaucer's Treatise on the Astrolabe (1391).[2] Etymonline dates it to the mid-15th century,[3] Merriam-Webster to the 15th century[4] and Dictionary.com to 1300–50.[7]

Semantic evolution

In 1440 the Promptorium Parvulorum has it for the sun's appearance itself, and the word later covered the colours and light of the sky at that moment, seen as a spectacle.[2] It could also mean the direction of sunrise, the east,[3][5] as the earlier sunrist did.[6] The figurative sense, the beginning or first rise of something, is recorded from 1623.[2] In 1890 an American newspaper used it for a yellowish pink colour.[2] In the late 20th century, sunrise industry named a new and expanding industry, especially in electronics and computing,[5][8] and Merriam-Webster gives an adjective meaning "newly created and growing".[4]

Timeline

  • mid-13th century – sunrising.[3]
  • mid-14th century – sunrist.[3]
  • c. 1400 – the time when the sun rises (Chaucer).[2]
  • 1440 – the appearance of the sun; the colours in the sky.[2]
  • 1623 – figurative, a beginning.[2]
  • 1890 – a yellowish pink colour.[2]

Modern meaning

Noun

  1. The daily appearance of the sun above the horizon; dawn.
  2. The time at which this happens.
  3. The colours and light in the sky as the sun rises.
  4. (figurative) A beginning or emergence.
  5. A yellowish pink colour.

Adjective

  1. Of an industry or technology: new and growing: a sunrise business.

Word family

  • sunrise service
  • tequila sunrise

References

  1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  4. ^ a b c Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  5. ^ a b c Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  6. ^ a b Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
  7. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
  8. ^ Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins