madder

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈmædə(ɹ)/, [ˈmadə(ɹ)]
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈmædɚ/, [ˈmæɾɚ]

• Audio (US)

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• Rhymes: -ædə(ɹ)

From Middle English mader, madere, mædere, from Old English mædere, mæddre, mædre, from Proto-Germanic *madarǭ (compare Swedish madra, Old Norse / Icelandic maðra), from Proto-Indo-European *modʰro-, cognate with Proto-Slavic *modrъ (“blue”), and compare Irish madar (“madder”), Latvian madara (“madder”).

madder (countable and uncountable, plural madders)

1. A herbaceous plant, Rubia tinctorum, native to Asia, cultivated for a red-purple dye (alizarin) obtained from the root.
2. The root of the plant, used as a medicine or a dye.
3. A dye made from the plant.
4. A deep reddish colour, like that of the dye.

   madder:  

   • 1946, Mervyn Peake, Titus Groan:

     Her big head has coloured to a dim and dreadful madder.

• (Rubia tinctorum): common madder, dyer's madder

madder (not comparable)

1. Of a deep reddish purple colour, like that of the dye.

madder (third-person singular simple present madders, present participle maddering, simple past and past participle maddered)

1. (transitive, rare) To dye with madder.

• bedstraw
• bluet
• genipap
• Appendix:Colors

Inflected forms.

madder

1. comparative form of mad: more mad

From Irish meadar.

madder (plural madders)

1. Obsolete form of mether.
   • c.1720 Jonathan Swift (translation from the Irish) "O'Rourke's Feast":

     Usequebaugh to our feast - In pails was brought up,

     A hundred at least, - And the madder our cup,

     O there is the sport! […]

• Tenison, Thomas Joseph (1860) "On Methers and Other Ancient Drinking Vessels" Journal of the Kilkenny and South-East of Ireland Archaeological Society Vol.3NS No.1 p.54

madder (third-person singular simple present madders, present participle maddering, simple past and past participle maddered)

1. Eye dialect spelling of matter.

• MedDRA, dermad, dream'd, marded

madder

1. comparative degree of mad