flourish

Meanings

Verb

• To thrive or grow well.
• To prosper or fare well.
• To be in a period of greatest influence.
• To develop; to make thrive; to expand.
• To make bold, sweeping movements with.
• To make bold and sweeping, fanciful, or wanton movements, by way of ornament, parade, bravado, etc.; to play with fantastic and irregular motion.
• To use florid language; to indulge in rhetorical figures and lofty expressions.
• To make ornamental strokes with the pen; to write graceful, decorative figures.
• To adorn with beautiful figures or rhetoric; to ornament with anything showy; to embellish.
• To execute an irregular or fanciful strain of music, by way of ornament or prelude.
• To boast; to vaunt; to brag.

Noun

• A dramatic gesture such as the waving of a flag.
• An ornamentation.
• A ceremonious passage such as a fanfare.
• A decorative embellishment on a building.

Origin

• From Middle English floryschen, from Old French florir, stem of some conjugated forms of florir (compare French fleurir), from Vulgar Latin *florīre, from Latin flōreō ("I bloom") (and conjugation partly from flōrēscō), from flōs. See flower + -ish.