bronze

From French bronze (1511); from Italian bronzo (13th c.), of uncertain origin (q.v.). First use appears c. 1721 in the writings of Matthew Prior (for which, see citation below).

• (UK) IPA^(key): /bɹɒnz/
• (US) IPA^(key): /bɹɑnz/

• Audio (US):

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• Audio (General Australian):

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• Audio (Southern England):

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• Rhymes: -ɒnz

bronze (countable and uncountable, plural bronzes)

2. (uncountable) A naturally occurring or man-made alloy of copper, usually in combination with tin, but also with one or more other metals.
   • 1720, Matthew Prior, Poems on Several Occasions, page 339:

     How little gives thee joy or pain; A print, a bronze, a flower, a root.

   Coordinate term: brass

3. (countable and uncountable) A reddish-brown colour, the colour of bronze.

   bronze:  

4. (countable) A work of art made of bronze, especially a sculpture.
5. A bronze medal; third place.

   She wanted to win the tournament, but had to settle for the bronze after being beaten in the semi-finals.

6. Boldness; impudence.

   Synonym: brass

   • 1728, [Alexander Pope], “(please specify the page)”, in The Dunciad. An Heroic Poem. […], Dublin, London: […] A. Dodd, →OCLC:

     Embrown'd with native bronze, lo! Henley stands.

bronze (comparative more bronze, superlative most bronze)

1. Made of bronze metal.

   Synonym: bronzen

   • 1907 August, Robert W[illiam] Chambers, chapter I, in The Younger Set, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, →OCLC:

     The house was a big elaborate limestone affair, evidently new. Winter sunshine sparkled on lace-hung casement, on glass marquise, and the burnished bronze foliations of grille and door.

2. Having a reddish-brown colour.
3. (of the skin) Tanned; darkened as a result of exposure to the sun.
   • 2016, Kit Moulton, Annabella, page 108:

     That girl was dynamite. Dark hair with killer blue eyes, bronze skin, and an exquisite full-figured body.

bronze (third-person singular simple present bronzes, present participle bronzing, simple past and past participle bronzed)

1. (transitive) To plate with bronze.

   My mother bronzed my first pair of baby shoes.

2. (transitive) To color bronze; (of the sun) to tan.
   • 1925, DuBose Heyward, Porgy‎^[1], London: Jonathan Cape, Part IV, p. 137:

     The sun was so low that its level rays shot through the tunnels of the forest and bronzed its ceiling of woven leaves when Bess returned to the clearing.

   • 1961, Freya Stark, chapter 8, in Dust in the Lion's Paw: Autobiography 1939-1946, New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, page 122:

     North is the bay of Acre, lovely in shape, and, far, far beyond, the cloudy vision of Hermon, its huge landscape now only attainable with a police pass—beautifully solitary except for good-looking young men of the police patrols, all fit and bronzed.

3. (intransitive, of the skin) To change to a bronze or tan colour due to exposure to the sun.
   • 2006, Melissa Lassor, “Out of Darkness”, in Watching Time, page 124:

     His skin began to bronze as he worked in our garden each day.

4. (transitive) To make hard or unfeeling; to brazen.
   • 1815 February 24, [Walter Scott], Guy Mannering; or, The Astrologer. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), Edinburgh: […] James Ballantyne and Co. for Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, […]; and Archibald Constable and Co., […], →OCLC:

     the lawyer who bronzes his bosom instead of his forehead

5. (intransitive) To finish in third place; to win a bronze medal.
   • 1979, Amateur Athletic Union of the United States, AAU News:

     Louganis' runner-up count was 822.09, and Boggs bronzed at 783.78.

   • 1992, Martin Connors, Diane L. Dupuis, Brad Morgan, The Olympics Factbook: A Spectator's Guide to the Winter and Summer Games, Visible Ink Press:

     Her speedskating teammate, Leah Poulos, captured a 1000m silver in 1976, behind Tatiana Averina of the Soviet Union, who also took the gold in the 3000m and bronzed in the 500m and the 1500m.

   • 2016 March 17, Andrew Lapin, “'The Bronze' Is The Story Of A Mighty, Nasty Gymnast”, in NPR‎^[2]:

     Rauch plays has-been athlete Hope Ann Greggory, who bronzed at the Olympics by prevailing over a performance-incurred injury that would later effectively end her career.

• rebronze

• bonzer

• bronzo

• IPA^(key): (Central, Balearic) [ˈbɾon.zə]
• IPA^(key): (Valencia) [ˈbɾon.ze]

• Audio (Valencia):

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• Rhymes: -onze

bronze m (plural bronzes)

1. bronze (metal)
2. bronze medal

• “bronze”, in Diccionari de la llengua catalana [Dictionary of the Catalan Language] (in Catalan), second edition, Institute of Catalan Studies [Catalan: Institut d'Estudis Catalans], April 2007
• “bronze”, in Gran Diccionari de la Llengua Catalana, Grup Enciclopèdia Catalana, 2025
• “bronze” in Diccionari normatiu valencià, Acadèmia Valenciana de la Llengua.
• “bronze” in Diccionari català-valencià-balear, Antoni Maria Alcover and Francesc de Borja Moll, 1962.

Borrowed from French bronze.

• IPA^(key): [ˈb̥ʁʌŋsə]

bronze c (singular definite bronzen, plural indefinite bronzer)

1. (uncountable) bronze (element; colour)
2. (countable) bronze (work of art made of bronze), bronze medal

• bronze on the Danish Wikipedia.Wikipedia ^da

Borrowed from Italian bronzo.

• IPA^(key): /bʁɔ̃z/

• Audio:

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bronze m (plural bronzes)

1. bronze (metal, work of art)

• âge de bronze
• couler un bronze
• médaille de bronze
• mouler un bronze

• → Danish: bronze
  • → Greenlandic: bronze
• → English: bronze
• → Norwegian: bronse
• → Persian: برنز (boronz)
• → Portuguese: bronze

bronze

1. inflection of bronzer:
   1. first/third-person singular present indicative/subjunctive
   2. second-person singular imperative

• “bronze”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

• bornez

Borrowed from Danish bronze; see English bronze etymology.

bronze

1. bronze

• Audio (Béarn):

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bronze m (plural bronzes)

1. bronze

Borrowed from French bronze, from Italian bronzo,^[1][2] either from Byzantine Greek βροντησίον (brontēsíon), presumably from Βρεντήσιον (Brentḗsion, “Brindisi”), known for the manufacture of bronze; or ultimately from Persian برنج (berenj, beranj, “brass”) ~ پرنگ (pereng, “copper”).

• Hyphenation: bron‧ze

bronze m (plural bronzes)

1. bronze (a naturally occurring or man-made alloy of copper)
2. skin tan