different between varlet vs wretch

English

Etymology

From Old French varlet. Compare valet.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /?v??l?t/

Noun

varlet (plural varlets)

1. (obsolete) A servant or attendant.
   • 1843, Thomas Carlyle, Past and Present, book 2, ch. 8, The Electon

     The Winchester Manorhouse has fled bodily, like a Dream of the old Night […] . House and people, royal and episcopal, lords and varlets, where are they?

2. (historical) Specifically, a youth acting as a knight's attendant at the beginning of his training for knighthood.
3. (archaic) A rogue or scoundrel.
   • 1749, Henry Fielding, Tom Jones, Folio Society 1973, p. 410:

     My lady to be called a nasty Scotch wh–re by such a varlet!—To be sure I wish I had knocked his brains out with the punchbowl.

   • 1886, Henry James, The Bostonians.

     He was false, cunning, vulgar, ignoble; the cheapest kind of human product […] The white, puffy mother, with the high forehead, in the corner there, looked more like a lady; but if she were one, it was all the more shame to her to have mated with such a varlet, Ransom said to himself, making use, as he did generally, of terms of opprobrium extracted from the older English literature.

4. (obsolete, card games) The jack.

Translations

Anagrams

• retval, travel

Old French

Noun

varlet m (oblique plural varlez or varletz, nominative singular varlez or varletz, nominative plural varlet)

1. Alternative form of vaslet

English

Etymology 1

From Middle English wrecche, from Old English wre??a (“exile, outcast”), from Proto-Germanic *wrakjô (“exile, fugitive, warrior”), from Proto-Indo-European *wreg- (“to track, follow”). Doublet of garçon.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /??t?/
• Rhymes: -?t?
• Homophone: retch

Noun

wretch (plural wretches)

1. An unhappy, unfortunate, or miserable person.
2. An unpleasant, annoying, worthless, or despicable person.
   • 1885, Richard F. Burton, The Supplemental Nights to the Thousand Nights and a Night, Night 532:

     […] Alaeddin ate and drank and was cheered and after he had rested and had recovered spirits he cried, "Ah, O my mother, I have a sore grievance against thee for leaving me to that accursed wight who strave to compass my destruction and designed to take my life. Know that I beheld Death with mine own eyes at the hand of this damned wretch, whom thou didst certify to be my uncle; […]
3. (archaic) An exile. (Can we add an example for this sense?)

Derived terms

• wretched

Translations

Etymology 2

Verb

wretch (third-person singular simple present wretches, present participle wretching, simple past and past participle wretched)

1. Misspelling of retch.

Further reading

• wretch in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• wretch in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.
• wretch at OneLook Dictionary Search
• Douglas Harper (2001–2021) , “wretch”, in Online Etymology Dictionary