Limnen

Part of speech: verb

Definitions

1. To depict something by painting or drawing it, especially a small detailed portrait ; to portray a person or scene vividly in written or spoken words
2. To create a picture of someone or something through brush and pigment ; to convey a vivid impression of a subject through description
3. Archaically, to illustrate or paint a likeness of a figure ; to sketch out a scene or character in striking verbal detail

Etymology: Before it meant painting, this word meant lighting up. Its ancestor is the Latin "illuminare," "to light up," from "lumen," "light." Medieval scribes used gold and bright colours to decorate the initial letters and borders of manuscripts, so the Old French "enluminer" came to mean decorating a page with colour. English borrowed that sense as Middle English "lymnen," and the "i" of "illuminate" was dropped along the way. The meaning narrowed from decorating a manuscript to painting in general, and especially to making a portrait or a small, detailed picture. A painter of such miniatures was called a "limner." The word now mostly appears in literary contexts, where it suggests careful, precise description as well as paint.