HALCYON • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Halcyon

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/hˈælsiən/ Listen

Halcyon

adjective

Idyllically calm and peaceful; suggesting happy tranquillity.

Marked by peace and prosperity. Synonyms: golden, prosperous. "The halcyon days of the clipper trade"

noun

(Greek mythology) a woman who was turned into a kingfisher. Synonym: Alcyone.

A large kingfisher widely distributed in warmer parts of the Old World. Synonym: genus Halcyon.

A mythical bird said to breed at the time of the winter solstice in a nest floating on the sea and to have the power of calming the winds and waves.

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"Halcyon" Quotes from Famous Books

... singing bird Whose nest is in a watered shoot; My heart is like an apple tree Whose boughs are bent with thickset fruit; My heart is like a rainbow shell That paddles in a halcyon sea; My heart is gladder than all these, Because my love ...

— Missy • Dana Gatlin

... and three light cruisers, the Kolberg, the Graudenz, and the Strasburg. They were mainly fast vessels and the battle cruisers carried eleven-inch guns. Early in the morning they ran through the nets of a British fishing fleet. Later an old coast police boat, the Halcyon, was shot at a few times. About eight o'clock they were opposite Yarmouth, and proceeded to bombard that naval station from a distance of about ten miles. Their range was poor and their shells did no damage. They then turned swiftly for home, but on the road back the York ...

— History of the World War - An Authentic Narrative of the World's Greatest War • Francis A. March and Richard J. Beamish

... nest of the halcyon or kingfisher, supposed to float on the sea, which our Saint describes so well and applies so exquisitely in one of his letters, was the true picture of his own heart. The great stoic, Seneca, says ...

— The Spirit of St. Francis de Sales • Jean Pierre Camus

... one follows the high walls of the Villa Palmieri, which is now very private American property, but is famous for ever as the first refuge of Boccaccio's seven young women and three young men when they fled from plague-stricken Florence in 1348 and told tales for ten halcyon days. It is now generally agreed that if Boccaccio had any particular house in his mind it was this. It used to be thought that the Villa Poggio Gherardo, Mrs. Ross's beautiful home on the way to ...

— A Wanderer in Florence • E. V. Lucas

... the valley below—they all carried with them an inexpressible magic for the man wandering on the moor. So did the movements of birds—the rise of a couple of startled grouse, the hovering of two kestrels, a flight of wild duck in the distance. Each and all reminded him of the halcyon times of life—adventures of his boyhood, the sporting pleasures of his manhood. By George!—how ...

— Lady Connie • Mrs. Humphry Ward

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