QUAINT • DICCIONARIO INGLES.COM • Definition of Quaint

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/kweɪnt/ Listen

adjective

Quaint adj.

1.

Prudent; wise; hence, crafty; artful; wily. (Obs.) "Clerks be full subtle and full quaint."

2.

Characterized by ingenuity or art; finely fashioned; skillfully wrought; elegant; graceful; nice; neat. (Archaic) " The queynte ring." " His queynte spear." " A shepherd young quaint." "Every look was coy and wondrous quaint." "To show bow quaint an orator you are."

3.

Curious and fanciful; affected; odd; whimsical; antique; archaic; singular; unusual; as, quaint architecture; a quaint expression. "Some stroke of quaint yet simple pleasantry." "An old, long-faced, long-bodied servant in quaint livery."

Synonyms: Quaint, Odd, Antique. Antique is applied to that which has come down from the ancients, or which is made to imitate some ancient work of art. Odd implies disharmony, incongruity, or unevenness. An odd thing or person is an exception to general rules of calculation and procedure, or expectation and common experience. In the current use of quaint, the two ideas of odd and antique are combined, and the word is commonly applied to that which is pleasing by reason of both these qualities. Thus, we speak of the quaint architecture of many old buildings in London; or a quaint expression, uniting at once the antique and the fanciful.

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Etymology of 'Quaint'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Quaint" Quotes from Famous Books

... old house had really turned out a number of interesting articles. There were tables, stands, settees, chairs, and a quaint old desk, set on a square pedestal with a base of carved lions' feet. This last interested Josie as soon as it was carried into the shop. The top part was somewhat dilapidated, the cover of the desk ...

— Mary Louise and the Liberty Girls • Edith Van Dyne (AKA L. Frank Baum)

... was old and quaint and rambling, part of the old wattle and dab walls yet remaining in some of the outhouses, as well as the grey shingle roof. There was a more modern part, for the house had been added to from time to time by different owners, though no additions had been made since Norah's father ...

— A Little Bush Maid • Mary Grant Bruce

... when, tired and dusty, the outfit pulled up at La Luz, a quaint hamlet nestling in the foothills of the Sacramento Mountains. The place they found to be largely Mexican, and it was almost as if the visitors had slipped over the border to find themselves in ...

— The Pony Rider Boys in New Mexico • Frank Gee Patchin

... quaint bit of humor, many a strong, sound lesson in manliness and womanliness which must appeal to us in the telling. The story was probably written for children, but it will interest older people as ...

— The Widow O'Callaghan's Boys • Gulielma Zollinger

... discussion was going on, the cloud of limestone dust had disappeared and from it had emerged a quaint old coach, lumbering and shabby, drawn by a pair of sleek sorrel horses, whose teeth would have given evidence of advanced age had a possible purchaser submitted them to the indignity of examining them. Their progress ...

— The Comings of Cousin Ann • Emma Speed Sampson

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