pastoral
pronunciation
How to pronounce pastoral in British English:
UK [ˈpɑːstərəl]
How to pronounce pastoral in American English:
US [ˈpæstərəl]
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- Noun:
- a musical composition that evokes rural life
- a letter from a pastor to the congregation
- a literary work idealizing the rural life (especially the life of shepherds)
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- Adjective:
- of or relating to a pastor
- relating to shepherds or herdsmen or devoted to raising sheep or cattle
- used of idealized country life
- suggestive of an idyll; charmingly simple and serene
Word Origin
- pastoral (adj.)
- "of or pertaining to shepherds," early 15c., from Old French pastoral (13c.), from Latin pastoralis "of herdsmen, of shepherds," from pastor (see pastor (n.)). The noun sense of "poem dealing with country life generally," usually dealing with it in an idealized form and emphasizing the purity and happiness of it, is from 1580s.
Example
- 1. Nothing typifies america 's pastoral ideal like a big old barn .
- 2. The total effect was far from pastoral , however , even though dickinson thought that to make a prairie it takes a clover and one bee .
- 3. The first-born son of adam and eve ( gen. 4 ) . He became a tiller of the ground , while his brother abel followed the pursuits of pastoral life .
- 4. A moving paean to a vanishing pastoral england , an enlightened manifesto for female emancipation and a bold challenge to the realist novel - the rainbow , like its equally controversial sequel women in love , is remembered by most of its readers for the sex .
- 5. Her photos were amber-tinted and pastoral .