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Knave vs Varlet - What's the difference?

knave | varlet |

In archaic terms the difference between knave and varlet

is that knave is any male servant; a menial while varlet is a rogue or scoundrel.

knave

English

Noun

(en noun)
  • (archaic) A boy; especially, a boy servant.
  • (archaic) Any male servant; a menial.
  • A tricky, deceitful fellow; a dishonest person; a rogue; a villain.
  • *
  • *:I had never defrauded a man of a farthing, nor called him knave behind his back. But now the last rag that covered my nakedness had been torn from me. I was branded a blackleg, card-sharper, and murderer.
  • *1977 , (Geoffrey Chaucer), (The Canterbury Tales) , Penguin Classics, p. 204:
  • *:God's bones! Whenever I go to beat those knaves / my tapsters, out she [my wife] comes with clubs and staves, / "Go on!" she screams — and its a caterwaul — / "You kill those dogs! Break back and bones and all!"
  • (cards) A playing card marked with the figure of a servant or soldier; a jack.

    • Synonyms

    * See also

    Derived terms

    * knavery * knavish

    varlet

    English

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • (obsolete) A servant or attendant.
  • * 1843 , '', 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?
  • (historical) Specifically, a youth acting as a knight's attendant at the beginning of his training for knighthood.
  • (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 , , 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.
  • (obsolete, cards) The jack.

    • Anagrams

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