Definition

Noun: 1. A green dye: A specific type of green dye historically obtained from the woad plant (Isatis tinctoria), often used for coloring cloth, particularly wool.

Usage Notes

• Historical Context: The term "kendal" is primarily historical. It refers to a specific dye product from a time when natural plant sources were the primary means of coloring textiles.
• Capitalization: It is typically written with a lowercase 'k' (kendal), though it originates from the place name Kendal in Cumbria, England, which was a center for its production and trade.
• Specificity: It denotes not just any green dye, but one with a particular origin (woad) and historical association.

Examples

• The medieval tapestry was colored using traditional dyes like kendal and madder.
• Woolens dyed with kendal were known for their distinctive green hue.
• The recipe for producing kendal from woad leaves was a closely guarded secret.

Advanced Usage

• "Kendal green": This is a common compound term used to describe the specific shade of green produced by this dye or the cloth colored with it.
  • In Shakespeare's Henry IV, Part 1, Falstaff disparages his recruits as "slaves as ragged as Lazarus in the painted cloth, where the glutton's dogs licked his sores; and such as indeed were never soldiers, but discarded unjust serving-men, younger sons to younger brothers, revolted tapsters, and ostlers trade-fallen; the cankers of a calm world and a long peace; ten times more dishonourable ragged than an old faced ancient: and such have I, to fill up the rooms of them that have bought out their services, that you would think that I had a hundred and fifty tattered prodigals lately come from swine-keeping, from eating draff and husks. A mad fellow met me on the way and told me I had unloaded all the gibbets and pressed the dead bodies. No eye hath seen such scarecrows. I'll not march through Coventry with them, that's flat: nay, and the villains march wide betwixt the legs, as if they had gyves on; for indeed I had the most of them out of prison. There's but a shirt and a half in all my company; and the half shirt is two napkins tacked together and thrown over the shoulders like a herald's coat without sleeves; and the shirt, to say the truth, stolen from my host at Saint Alban's, or the red-nose innkeeper of Daventry. But that's all one; they'll find linen enough on every hedge." (He later refers to some of his men as being in "kendal green").

Variants and Related Words

• Kendal green (noun phrase): The green color characteristic of this dye; cloth of this color.
• Woad (noun): The plant () from which kendal dye was historically produced, yielding a blue dye that could be over-dyed with yellow to create green.

Synonyms

• Green dye
• Vegetable dye (a more general term)
• Plant-based dye

Notes on Meaning

The word "kendal" has a very specific and narrow meaning. It is not a general term for the color green or for dyeing. Its core definition is tied to a historical manufacturing process and product. There are no distinct phrasal verbs or idioms based on this single word.

Noun

1. a green dye, often used to color cloth, which is obtained from the woad plant