different between blunt vs sincere

English

Pronunciation

• (UK, US) IPA^(key): /bl?nt/
• Rhymes: -?nt

Etymology 1

From Middle English blunt, blont, from Old English *blunt (attested in the derivative Blunta (male personal name) (> English surnames Blunt, Blount)), probably of North Germanic origin, possibly related to Old Norse blunda (“to doze”) (> Icelandic blunda, Swedish blunda, Danish blunde).

Adjective

blunt (comparative blunter, superlative bluntest)

1. Having a thick edge or point; not sharp.
2. Dull in understanding; slow of discernment; opposed to acute.
3. Abrupt in address; plain; unceremonious; wanting the forms of civility; rough in manners or speech.

   the blunt admission that he had never liked my company
4. Hard to impress or penetrate.
   • December 30, 1736, Alexander Pope, letter to Jonathan Swift

     I find my heart hardened and blunt to new impressions.

5. Slow or deficient in feeling: insensitive.

Synonyms

• (having a thick edge or point): dull, pointless, coarse
• (dull in understanding): stupid, obtuse
• (abrupt in address): curt, short, rude, brusque, impolite, uncivil, harsh

Derived terms

Translations

Noun

blunt (plural blunts)

1. A fencer's practice foil with a soft tip.
2. A short needle with a strong point.
3. (smoking) A marijuana cigar.
   • 2005: to make his point, lead rapper B-Real fired up a blunt in front of the cameras and several hundred thousand people and announced, “I'm taking a hit for every one of y'all!” — Martin Torgoff, Can't Find My Way Home (Simon & Schuster 2005, p. 461)
4. (Britain, slang, archaic, uncountable) money

   • Down he goes to the Commons, to see the lawyer and draw the blunt […]

5. A playboating move resembling a cartwheel performed on a wave.

Translations

Etymology 2

From Middle English blunten, blonten, from the adjective (see above).

Verb

blunt (third-person singular simple present blunts, present participle blunting, simple past and past participle blunted)

1. To dull the edge or point of, by making it thicker; to make blunt.
2. (figuratively) To repress or weaken; to impair the force, keenness, or susceptibility, of

   It blunted my appetite.

   My feeling towards her have been blunted.

Synonyms

• blunten

Translations

See also

• bluntly
• dull

Old French

Etymology

From Frankish *blund, from Proto-Germanic *blundaz, from Proto-Indo-European *b?lend?-.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /blont/, [bl?nt]

Adjective

blunt m (oblique and nominative feminine singular blunde)

1. Alternative form of blont

English

Etymology

From Middle French sincere, from Latin sincerus (“genuine”), from Proto-Indo-European *sin- + *?er- (“grow”), from which also Ceres (“goddess of harvest”) from which English cereal.

Unrelated to sine (“without”) cera (“wax”) (folk etymology); see Wikipedia discussion.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /s?n?s??(?)/
• Rhymes: -??(?)

Adjective

sincere (comparative more sincere or sincerer, superlative most sincere or sincerest)

1. Genuine; meaning what one says or does; heartfelt.

   I believe he is sincere in his offer to help.

2. Meant truly or earnestly.

   She gave it a sincere, if misguided effort.

3. (archaic) clean; pure

Synonyms

• earnest

Antonyms

• insincere

Related terms

• cereal
• Ceres
• crescent
• sincerity
• sincereness

Translations

Further reading

• sincere in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• sincere in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.

Anagrams

• cereins, ceresin, cerines, renices

Esperanto

Etymology

sincera +? -e

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /sin?t?sere/
• Hyphenation: sin?ce?re
• Rhymes: -ere

Adverb

sincere

1. sincerely

Antonyms

• malsincere (“insincerely”)

Italian

Adjective

sincere f pl

1. feminine plural of sincero

Anagrams

• censire, crisene, recensì, recinse, scernei, secerni

Latin

Etymology 1

Adverb

sinc?r? (not comparable)

1. uprightly, honestly, frankly, sincerely
   • 1st century, Catullus, Poem 109

     Di magni, facite ut vere promittere possit // atque id sincere dicat ex animo

Etymology 2

Adjective

sinc?re

1. vocative masculine singular of sinc?rus

References

• sincere in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• sincere in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers

Middle French

Etymology

First attested in 1441, borrowed from Latin sinc?rus.

Adjective

sincere m or f (plural sinceres)

1. sincere (genuinely meaning what one says or does)

Descendants

• ? English: sincere
• French: sincère

References

Spanish

Verb

sincere

1. First-person singular (yo) present subjunctive form of sincerarse.
2. Formal second-person singular (usted) present subjunctive form of sincerarse.
3. Third-person singular (él, ella, also used with usted^?) present subjunctive form of sincerarse.