different between pleasant vs sportive

English

Etymology

Partly from Old French plaisant, partly from Middle English [Term?], present participle of English please. Related to Dutch plezant (“full of fun or pleasure”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?pl?z?nt/
• Rhymes: -?z?nt

Adjective

pleasant (comparative pleasanter or more pleasant, superlative pleasantest or most pleasant)

1. Giving pleasure; pleasing in manner.
   • 1611, King James Version of the Bible, Psalm 133.1,^[1]

     Behold, how good and pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity!

   • 1871, Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking-Glass, Chapter ,^[2]

     “O Oysters, come and walk with us!”

     The Walrus did beseech.

     “A pleasant walk, a pleasant talk,

     Along the briny beach:

   • 1989, Hilary Mantel, Fludd, New York: Henry Holt, 2000, Chapter 2, p. 25,^[3]

     “ […] If you pray to St. Anne before twelve o’clock on a Wednesday, you’ll get a pleasant surprise before the end of the week.”

2. (obsolete) Facetious, joking.
   • c. 1598, William Shakespeare, Henry V, Act I, Scene 2,^[4]

     […] tell the pleasant prince this mock of his

     Hath turn’d his balls to gun-stones […]

   • 1600, Thomas Dekker, The Shoemaker’s Holiday, London, Dedication,^[5]

     […] I present you here with a merrie conceited Comedie, called the Shoomakers Holyday, acted by my Lorde Admiralls Players this present Christmasse, before the Queenes most excellent Maiestie. For the mirth and pleasant matter, by her Highnesse graciously accepted; being indeede no way offensiue.

Synonyms

• agreeable
• nice

Antonyms

• disagreeable
• nasty
• unpleasant

Derived terms

Translations

Noun

pleasant (plural pleasants)

1. (obsolete) A wit; a humorist; a buffoon.
   • 1603, Philemon Holland (translator), The Philosophie, commonlie called the Morals written by the learned philosopher Plutarch of Chæronea, London, p. 1144,^[6]

     […] Galba was no better than one of the buffons or pleasants that professe to make folke merry and to laugh.

   • 1696, uncredited translator, The General History of the Quakers by Gerard Croese, London: John Dunton, Book 2, p. 96,^[7]

     Yea, in the Courts of Kings and Princes, their Fools, and Pleasants, which they kept to relax them from grief and pensiveness, could not show themselves more dexterously ridiculous, than by representing the Quakers, or aping the motions of their mouth, voice, gesture, and countenance:

Anagrams

• planates, platanes

English

Etymology

From sport +? -ive.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?sp??(?)t?v/

Adjective

sportive (comparative more sportive, superlative most sportive)

1. (archaic) lively; merry; spritely
2. Playful, coltish.
3. Interested in sport.
4. Sporty, good at sport.

Derived terms

Translations

Noun

sportive (plural sportives)

1. (cycling) cyclosportive
   • 2012, July 15. Richard Williams in Guardian Unlimited, Tour de France 2012: Carpet tacks cannot force Bradley Wiggins off track

     Such incidents, part of the cherished mythology of the Tour's early years, are rare in modern cycling, although a 62-year-old local councillor was arrested and subsequently released after tacks had been scattered during the 2009 Etape Caledonia, a sportive held on closed roads in Scotland, causing countless punctures among the 3,500 riders.

Anagrams

• overtips, pivoters, repivots, sorptive, tip overs

French

Adjective

sportive

1. feminine singular of sportif

Noun

sportive f (plural sportives)

1. sportswoman

Further reading

• “sportive” in Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

German

Pronunciation

Adjective

sportive

1. inflection of sportiv:
   1. strong/mixed nominative/accusative feminine singular
   2. strong nominative/accusative plural
   3. weak nominative all-gender singular
   4. weak accusative feminine/neuter singular

Italian

Pronunciation

• Rhymes: -ive

Adjective

sportive f pl

1. feminine plural of sportivo

Noun

sportive f

1. plural of sportiva

Anagrams

• previsto, proviste