different between quaint vs sick

English

Pronunciation

• (UK, US) enPR: kw?nt, IPA^(key): /kwe?nt/, [k?we??nt]
• Rhymes: -e?nt

Etymology 1

From Middle English queynte, quoynte, from Anglo-Norman cointe, queinte and Old French cointe (“pretty, clever, knowing”), from Latin cognitus, past participle of cogn?sc? (“I know”).

Adjective

quaint (comparative quainter, superlative quaintest)

1. (obsolete) Of a person: cunning, crafty. [13th-19th c.]
   • 1591, William Shakespeare, Henry VI part 2:

     But you, my Lord, were glad to be imploy'd, / To shew how queint an Orator you are.

2. (obsolete) Cleverly made; artfully contrived. [14th-19th c.]
   • 1667, John Milton, Paradise Lost, Book IX:

     describe races and games, / Or tilting furniture, imblazon'd shields, / Impresses quaint, caparisons and steeds, / Bases and tinsel trappings [...].

3. (now dialectal) Strange or odd; unusual. [from 14th c.]
   • 1596, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, IV.4:

     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 […].

   • 1924, Time, 17 Nov 1924:

     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. [15th-19th c.]
   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, III.7:

     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. [from 18th c.]
   • 1815, Jane Austen, Emma:

     I admire all that quaint, old-fashioned politeness; it is much more to my taste than modern ease; modern ease often disgusts me.

   • 2011, Ian Sample, The Guardian, 31 Jan 2011:

     The rock is a haven for rare wildlife, a landscape where pretty hedgerows and quaint villages are bordered by a breathtaking, craggy coastline.

Synonyms

• (overly discriminating): See also Thesaurus:fastidious

Derived terms

• quaintly
• quaintness
• quaintsome

Translations

Etymology 2

A variant of cunt (possibly as a pun).

Noun

quaint (plural quaints)

1. (archaic) The vulva. [from 14th c.]
   • c. 1390, Geoffrey Chaucer, "The Wife of Bath's Tale", Canterbury Tales:

     And trewely, as myne housbondes tolde me, / I hadde þe beste queynte þat myghte be.

   • 2003, Peter Ackroyd, The Clerkenwell Tales, p. 9:

     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.’

Anagrams

• quinta

Middle English

Adjective

quaint

1. Alternative form of queynte

English

Pronunciation

• enPR: s?k, IPA^(key): /s?k/
• Rhymes: -?k
• Homophones: sic, Sikh

Etymology 1

From Middle English sik, sike, seek, seke, seok, from Old English s?oc (“sick, ill”), from Proto-West Germanic *seuk, from Proto-Germanic *seukaz (compare West Frisian siik, Dutch ziek, German siech, Norwegian Bokmål syk, Norwegian Nynorsk sjuk), from Proto-Indo-European *sewg- (“to be troubled or grieved”); compare Middle Irish socht (“silence, depression”), Old Armenian ???????? (hiwcanim, “I am weakening”).

Adjective

sick (comparative sicker, superlative sickest)

1. (more common in the US) In poor health; ill.

   Synonyms: ill, not well, poorly, sickly, unwell

   Antonyms: fit, healthy, well

2. Having an urge to vomit.

   Synonym: nauseated

   • 1913, The Texas criminal reports, page 8:

     In the meantime the old man had gotten up and gone out in the yard and began to vomit. Henry said I believe I feel sick and got up and went out. He went out one door and his father went out the other one. I did not think there was anything wrong with the coffee and I asked my wife to pour this out […]

   • 1918, Cecil Day Lewis, The Whispering Roots, Jonathan Cape, page 140:

     Q. Didn't he complain he was sick before he commenced to vomit?

     A. He did, just before he said, to me, “I feel sick,” I asked him if he wanted to throw up and he said yes.

   • 1958, Gene D'Olive, Chiara, Signet Book

     […] trying hard to cry. Crying's good. Crying teaches him to breathe. But I wish he weren't crying from hunger. I feel dizzy. I sit down and feel a little sick. Maybe I'll vomit, too. No, I never vomit. I feel sick, but I won't vomit. I never vomit.

   • 2013, Cheryl Rainfield, Stained, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (?ISBN), page 38:

     I feel sick, like I might vomit, and I'm more tired than I can ever remember feeling.

3. (colloquial) Mentally unstable, disturbed.

   Synonyms: disturbed, twisted, warped

4. (colloquial) In bad taste.

5. Tired of or annoyed by something.
6. (slang) Very good, excellent, awesome, badass.

   Synonyms: rad, wicked

   Antonyms: crap, naff, uncool

7. In poor condition.

8. (agriculture) Failing to sustain adequate harvests of crop, usually specified.

Synonyms

• (in poor health): See also Thesaurus:diseased
• (having an urge to vomit): See also Thesaurus:nauseated
• (slang: excellent): See also Thesaurus:excellent

Derived terms

Descendants

• ?? Navajo: sxih

Translations

Noun

sick (uncountable)

1. (Britain, Australia, colloquial) Vomit.
2. (Britain, colloquial) (especially in the phrases on the sick and on long-term sick) Any of various current or former benefits or allowances paid by the Government to support the sick, disabled or incapacitated

Synonyms

• (vomit): See Thesaurus:vomit

Translations

Verb

sick (third-person singular simple present sicks, present participle sicking, simple past and past participle sicked)

1. (colloquial) To vomit.

2. (obsolete, intransitive) To fall sick; to sicken.
   • circa 1598, William Shakespeare, King Henry IV, part 2:

     Our great-grandsire, Edward, sick'd and died.

Etymology 2

Variant of sic, itself an alteration of seek.

Verb

sick (third-person singular simple present sicks, present participle sicking, simple past and past participle sicked)

1. (rare) Alternative spelling of sic
   • 1920, James Oliver Curwood, "Back to God's Country"

     "Wapi," she almost screamed, "go back! Sick 'em, Wapi—sick 'em—sick 'em—sick 'em!"

   • 1938, Eugene Gay-Tifft, translator, The Saga of Frank Dover by Johannes Buchholtz, 2005 Kessinger Publishing edition, ?ISBN, page 125,

     When we were at work swabbing the deck, necessarily barelegged, Pelle would sick the dog on us; and it was an endless source of pleasure to him when the dog succeeded in fastening its teeth in our legs and making the blood run down our ankles.

   • 1957, J. D. Salinger, "Zooey", in, 1961, Franny and Zooey, 1991 LB Books edition, page 154,

     "...is just something God sicks on people who have the gall to accuse Him of having created an ugly world."

   • 2001 (publication date), Anna Heilman, Never Far Away: The Auschwitz Chronicles of Anna Heilman, University of Calgary Press, ?ISBN, page 82,

     Now they find a new entertainment: they sick the dog on us.

Anagrams

• CKIs