different between courtesan vs oiran

English

Etymology

Borrowed from French courtisane, from Italian cortigiana, feminine of cortigiano (“courtier”), from corte (“court”), itself from Latin cohors.

Pronunciation

• (UK, non-rhotic) IPA^(key): /k??t??zæn/, /?k??t?zæn/, /?k??t?z?n/
• (UK, rhotic) IPA^(key): /k??t??zæn/, /?k??t?zæn/, /?k??t?z?n/
• (US) IPA^(key): /?k??t?z?n/, /?k??t?zæn/, /?ko?t?z?n/, /?ko?t?zæn/

Noun

courtesan (plural courtesans)

1. (archaic) A woman of a royal or noble court.
2. (dated) The mistress of a royal or noble.
3. A female prostitute, especially one with high-status or wealthy clients.

   Synonyms: see Thesaurus:prostitute

   • 2014, Frances Wilson, The Courtesan's Revenge, Faber & Faber (?ISBN), page 10:

     In the notes he wrote for Nana, his novel about a courtesan in Second Empire Paris, Zola imagined ‘a whole society hurling itself’ at her body, ‘a pack of hounds after a bitch, who is not even on heat and makes fun of the hounds following her’. This might also describe the life of Harriette Wilson, whose unguarded pursuit by the leaders of the British aristocracy, the army, the government and opposition made her the most desired, and then the most dangerous, woman in Regency London.

Translations

Further reading

• courtesan on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

References

Anagrams

• acentrous, ancestour, auncestor, courantes, ctenosaur, nectarous, outrances

English

Etymology

From Japanese ??, literally ‘flower-leader’.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?????n/

Noun

oiran (plural oiran or oirans)

1. A high-status courtesan in Japan.
   • 2002, Donald Richie, The Inland Sea (Stone Bridge Press 2002, p. 192)

     The oiran of Mitarai was not like the geisha. Like the great eighteenth-century courtesans of Europe, she knew who and what she was and turned wanton provocation into an art.

Anagrams

• Arion, Irano-, Riano, noria, on air, on-air, raion

Catalan

Verb

oiran

1. third-person plural future indicative form of oir

Japanese

Romanization

oiran

1. R?maji transcription of ????