Definify.com
Webster 1913 Edition
Blackwash
{
, Black′ washˊ
(blăk′wŏsh)
or Black′wash
}Noun.
1.
(Med.)
A lotion made by mixing calomel and lime water.
2.
A wash that blackens, as opposed to
whitewash
; hence, figuratively, calumny. To remove as far as he can the modern layers of
black wash
, and let the man himself, fair or foul, be seen. C. Kingsley.
Definition 2024
blackwash
blackwash
English
Noun
blackwash (plural blackwashes)
- (slang, New Zealand) A whitewash victory for any New Zealand national sporting team.
- (slang, cricket) A whitewash victory for the West Indies cricket team. Started in the 1984–86 "Blackwash" series of the West Indian cricket team in England in 1984.
- (medicine) A lotion made by mixing calomel and limewater.
- (slang, mining) public campaigns and advertising funded by the coal industry to draw attention away from environmentally unsustainable practices or to justify exclusion from carbon taxes.
Synonyms
- (New Zealand victory): blackout
Related terms
Verb
blackwash (third-person singular simple present blackwashes, present participle blackwashing, simple past and past participle blackwashed)
- (transitive) To villainize, to present in a damaging light.
- 1904, George Bernard Shaw, John Bull's Other Island, page lxii:
- Mistrusting my own prejudices, I have taken the story from the two parliamentary papers in which our officials have done their utmost to whitewash the tribunals and the pigeon-shooting party, and to blackwash the villagers.
- 1904, George Bernard Shaw, John Bull's Other Island, page lxii:
- (transitive) To blacken, to cover with a black color.
- 2004, Peter Plate, Fogtown, page 109:
- The masts of British frigates and U.S. warships blackwashed the piers at the Embarcadero.
- 1892, Henry Ward Beecher, Plymouth Pulpit: Sermons Preached in Plymouth Church, Brooklyn, Sept 1873-Sept 1874, Volume 2:
- I do not care whether a man whitewashes or blackwashes his fence, or whether he uses guano or barnyard manure, or what his mode of cultivation may be, the question is, Does he get good fruit?
- 2004, Peter Plate, Fogtown, page 109: