serene

serene (sɪˈriːn)

—*adj*
1.	peaceful or tranquil; calm
2.	clear or bright: a serene sky
3.	(often capital) honoured: used as part of certain royal titles: His Serene Highness

[C16: from Latin serēnus]

se'renely

—*adv*

se'reneness

—n

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 10th Edition
2009 © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009
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Etymonline

Word Origin & History

serene

c.1500, "clear, calm," from L. serenus "peaceful, calm, clear" (of weather), of unknown origin. Applied to persons since 1630s.

Example sentences

The malls have that serene aura of undisturbed wilderness, with scarcely a

shopper in sight.

It would have been a serene tableau, except for the air-sucking whomp of

artillery shells.

The area was beautiful, the sounds serene, and even the smells delightful and

earthy.

The museum offers a serene setting for quiet reflection and learning.

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composure halcyon impassive patient quiet restful

Matching Quote

"Emerson was the greater artist. His essays contain some of the most beautiful language in our literature. How Henry James could have thought he had never developed a "style" is to me one of the mysteries of criticism. Thoreau in Walden comes close to the master, but he falls behind in the homeliness of his details and in the occasional smugness of his social satire. It almost seems as if he were reacting against the chiseled beauty of Emerson's prose. The latter's sentences were so fine that he needed nothing else. They became, like marble statues, part of the garden that was Concord. Their composer, serene, calm, detached, bland in speech and manner, the soft-spoken philosopher revered by all, did not often trouble himself on his strolls in the woods and along the river to pluck the flowers or feed squirrels or even identify the different species of flora and fauna. As Thoreau observed, he wouldn't have been willing to trundle a wheelbarrow through the streets of Concord because it would have seemed out of character. Emerson communed with nature on a spiritual level, using his eyes to take in the landscape and his lungs the fresh air. He had no needs to brace himself with cold or rain or spend the night under the stars."

-Louis Auchincloss