different between frail vs dainty
frail
English
Etymology
Borrowed from Old French fraile, from Latin fragilis. Cognate to fraction, fracture, and doublet of fragile.
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /f?e?l/
- Rhymes: -e?l
Adjective
frail (comparative frailer, superlative frailest)
- Easily broken physically; not firm or durable; liable to fail and perish
- 1831, John James Audubon, Ornithological Biography: Volume 1, Blue-grey Fly-catcher
- Its nest is composed of the frailest materials, and is light and small in proportion to the size of the bird
- 1831, John James Audubon, Ornithological Biography: Volume 1, Blue-grey Fly-catcher
- Weak; infirm.
- 1922, Isaac Rosenberg, Dawn
- O as the soft and frail lights break upon your eyelids
- 1922, Isaac Rosenberg, Dawn
- Mentally fragile.
- Liable to fall from virtue or be led into sin; not strong against temptation; weak in resolution; unchaste.
Derived terms
- frailly
- frailness
Related terms
Translations
Noun
frail (plural frails)
- A basket made of rushes, used chiefly to hold figs and raisins.
- The quantity of fruit or other items contained in a frail.
- A rush for weaving baskets.
- (dated, slang) A girl.
- 1931, Cab Calloway / Irving Mills, ‘Minnie the Moocher’:
- She was the roughest, toughest frail, but Minnie had a heart as big as a whale.
- 1939, Raymond Chandler, The Big Sleep, Penguin 2011, p. 148:
- ‘She's pickin' 'em tonight, right on the nose,’ he said. ‘That tall black-headed frail.’
- 1941, Preston Sturges, Sullivan's Travels, published in Five Screenplays, ?ISBN, page 77:
- Sullivan, the girl and the butler get to the ground. The girl wears a turtle-neck sweater, a cap slightly sideways, a torn coat, turned-up pants and sneakers.
- SULLIVAN Why don't you go back with the car... You look about as much like a boy as Mae West.
- THE GIRL All right, they'll think I'm your frail.
- 1931, Cab Calloway / Irving Mills, ‘Minnie the Moocher’:
Verb
frail (third-person singular simple present frails, present participle frailing, simple past and past participle frailed)
- To play a stringed instrument, usually a banjo, by picking with the back of a fingernail.
References
- frail in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
Anagrams
- filar, flair
frail From the web:
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dainty
English
Etymology
From Middle English deynte, from Old French deintié, from Latin dignit?tem. Doublet of dignity.
Pronunciation
- (UK, US) IPA(key): /?de?nti/
- Rhymes: -e?nti
Noun
dainty (plural dainties)
- A delicacy (in taste).
- 1791, William Cowper, The Odyssey of Homer
- (obsolete) Esteem, honour.
- (Canada, Prairies and northwestern Ontario) A fancy cookie, pastry, or square, typically homemade, served at a social event (usually plural).
- (obsolete) An affectionate term of address.
- (Can we find and add a quotation of Ben Jonson to this entry?)
Related terms
Translations
Adjective
dainty (comparative daintier, superlative daintiest)
- (obsolete) Excellent; valuable, fine.
- Elegant; delicately small and pretty.
- Fastidious and fussy, especially when eating.
- 1623, Francis Bacon, An Advertisement touching an Holy War
Synonyms
- neat
- petite
Derived terms
- daintily
- daintiness
Translations
References
- “dainty” in the Canadian Oxford Dictionary, Second Edition, Oxford University Press, 2004.
dainty From the web:
- what dainty means
- what dainty girl meaning
- what's dainty food
- dainty what does it mean
- dainty what is the definition
- what is dainty jewelry
- what does dignity mean
- what does dainty jewelry mean
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