quaint
adjectifnomattesté dans les dialogues
- //kweɪnt//
Strange or odd; unusual.
adjectif
- 1
obsolèteOf a person: cunning, crafty.
But you, my Lord, were glad to be imploy'd, / To shew how queint an Orator you are.
- 2
obsolèteCleverly made; artfully contrived.
describe races and games, / Or tilting furniture, imblazon'd shields, / Impresses quaint, caparisons and steeds, / Bases and tinsel trappings […].
- 3
Strange or odd; unusual.
Till that there entered on the other side / A straunger knight, from whence no man could reed, / In quyent disguise, full hard to be descride […].
Lord Gifford, deep beneath the ground, / Heard Alexander's bugle sound, / And tarried not his garb to change, / But, in his wizard habit strange, / Came forth, a quaint and fearful sight; [...]
What none would dispute though many smiled over was the good-humored, necessary, yet quaint omission of the writer's name from the whole consideration.
- 4
obsolèteOverly discriminating or needlessly meticulous; fastidious; prim.
She, nothing quaint / Nor 'sdeignfull of so homely fashion, / Sith brought she was now to so hard constraint, / Sate downe upon the dusty ground anon […].
- 5
Pleasingly unusual; especially, having old-fashioned charm.
I admire all that quaint, old-fashioned politeness; it is much more to my taste than modern ease; modern ease often disgusts me.
If you're fond of sand dunes and salty air, / Quaint little villages here and there, / You're sure to fall in love with old Cape Cod.
The rock is a haven for rare wildlife, a landscape where pretty hedgerows and quaint villages are bordered by a breathtaking, craggy coastline.
Étymologie
From Middle English queynte, quoynte, from Anglo-Norman cointe, queinte and Old French cointe (“pretty, clever, knowing”), from Latin cognitus, past participle of cognōscō (“to know”).
nom
- 1
historiqueThe vulva.
The rest looked on, horrified, as Clarice trussed up her habit and in open view placed her hand within her queynte[,] crying, ‘The first house of Sunday belongs to the sun, and the second to Venus.’
Formes
- pluriel
- quaints
- comparatif
- quainter
- superlatif
- quaintest