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Beau vs Merveilleux - What's the difference?

beau | merveilleux |

As a proper noun beau

is (male) used since mid-twentieth century.

As a noun merveilleux is

.

beau

English

Noun

(en-noun)
  • (dated) A man with a reputation for fine dress and etiquette; a dandy or fop.
  • * 1811 , Jane Austen, Sense and Sensibility , chapter 21
    • “I do not comprehend the meaning of the word. But this I can say, that if he ever was a beau before he married, he is one still, for there is not the smallest alteration in him.”
    “Oh! dear! one never thinks of married mens’(SIC) being beaux —they have something else to do.”
  • (dated) A male lover; a boyfriend.
  • * 1917 , Kate Douglas Wiggin, Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm , p. 142:
    • Hannah's beau takes all her time 'n' thought, and when she gits a husband her mother'll be out o' sight and out o' mind.
  • * 2009 , Philippa Bourke, Monsters and Critics [http://www.monstersandcritics.com/people/news/article_1518335.php/Kristin-Davis-takes-cover-on-beach-with-beau#ixzz0ZRsqa5SS], Dec 10, 2009:
    • Kristin Davis has taken time out to enjoy the surf and sand with her Australian beau , photographer Russell James.
  • A male escort.

    • See also

    * beau- * beautiful * Beau

    References

    * English nouns with irregular plurals ----

    merveilleux

    English

    Alternative forms

    *

    Noun

  • (label) and ‘fine ladies’ of the period of the , who affected a revival of the classical costume of ancient Greece.
  • * 1819 , The Metropolis: A Novel (second edition), volume II, page 57:
    • I did not stay very late at the party; and our marvellous promised to give us a list of the company..the ensuing day. [Cf. p. 59 Our military Exquisite.]
  • * 1892 October 19th, , page 5/1:
    • The ‘merveilleuse'’ of the Directory in France. The ‘' merveilleuse ’, or ‘ultra-fashionable’, as the writer..rather inadequately translates her title, ‘walked..half naked in the Champs Elysees’.
  • * 1898 , Mary Loyd (translator), (Octave Uzanne) (author), Fashion in Paris: The Various Phases of Feminine Taste and Æsthetics from 1797 to 1897 , chapter i, page 8:
    • The Ecrouelleux, the Inconcevables, the Merveilleux , with their chins sunk in their huge cravats.
  • * ibidem , page 19:
    • The Merveilleuses survived the Incroyables by a couple of years.

    References

    * “ ?Merveilleux, -euse]” on page 365/1 of § 1 (M; edited by (Henry Bradley)) of part ii (M–N) of volume VI (L–N; 1st ed., 1908) of [[w:Oxford English Dictionary, A New English Dictionary on Historical Principles] * “ ?merveilleux, -euse” in the Oxford English Dictionary (2nd ed., 1989)

    External links

    * (Incroyables and Merveilleuses) ----