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Lithe vs Petit - What's the difference?

lithe | petit |

As adjectives the difference between lithe and petit

is that lithe is mild; calm while petit is small or minor.

As a verb lithe

is to go.

As a noun lithe

is shelter.

lithe

English

Etymology 1

From (etyl) lithen, from (etyl) . See also (l), (l).

Verb

  • (obsolete) To go.
  • Etymology 2

    From (etyl) lithe, from (etyl) .

    Adjective

    (er)
  • (obsolete) Mild; calm.
  • ''lithe weather
  • slim but not skinny
  • lithe body
  • *
  • She was frankly disappointed. For some reason she had thought to discover a burglar of one or another accepted type—either a dashing cracksman in full-blown evening dress, lithe , polished, pantherish, or a common yegg, a red-eyed, unshaven burly brute in the rags and tatters of a tramp.
  • Capable of being easily bent; pliant; flexible; limber
  • the elephant’s lithe proboscis.
  • * 1861 , , page 125
  • … she danced with a kind of passionate fierceness, her lithe body undulating with flexuous grace …
    Synonyms
    * lithesome, lissome,

    Etymology 3

    From (etyl) lithen, from (etyl) .

    Verb

    (head)
  • (obsolete) To become calm.
  • (obsolete) To make soft or mild; soften; alleviate; mitigate; lessen; smooth; palliate.
  • Etymology 4

    From (etyl) lithen, from (etyl) . More at (l).

    Verb

    (lith)
  • (obsolete) To give ear; attend; listen.
  • To listen to.
  • Etymology 5

    Origin uncertain; perhaps an alteration of (lewth).

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • (Scotland) Shelter.
  • * 1932 , (Lewis Grassic Gibbon), Sunset Song :
  • So Cospatric got him the Pict folk to build a strong castle there in the lithe of the hills, with the Grampians dark and bleak behind it, and he had the Den drained and he married a Pict lady and got on her bairns and he lived there till he died.

    Anagrams

    *

    petit

    English

    Adjective

    (en adjective)
  • (legal, or, obsolete) small or minor
  • * South
  • By what small, petit hints does the mind catch hold of and recover a vanishing notion.

    Derived terms

    * petit constable * petit jury * petit larceny * petit serjeanty * petit treason

    See also

    * petite * petty * puisne ----