quaint

Valid in Scrabble

Scrabble points
15
Words With Friends
17
Letters
6
Pronunciation
/kweɪnt/(UK)
See all 2 pronunciations
/kweɪnt/(UK) · [kʰweɪ̯nt](UK)

Definition of quaint

6 senses · 2 parts of speech · etymology included

adj

  1. (obsolete)Of a person: cunning, crafty.
    “But you, my Lord, were glad to be imploy'd, / To shew how queint an Orator you are.”
See all 6 definitions

adj

  1. (obsolete)Of a person: cunning, crafty.
    “But you, my Lord, were glad to be imploy'd, / To shew how queint an Orator you are.”
  2. (obsolete)Cleverly made; artfully contrived.
    “describe races and games, / Or tilting furniture, imblazon'd shields, / Impresses quaint, caparisons and steeds, / Bases and tinsel trappings […].”
  3. (dialectal)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. (obsolete)Overly 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.”

noun

  1. (historical, obsolete)The 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.’”

Definitions from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA.

Etymology

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”).

Anagrams of quaint

2 plays · some not in Scrabble

Best play quinta 15 points

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