Quaint vs Curious - What's the difference?
quaint | curious | Related terms |
(obsolete) Of a person: cunning, crafty.
* 1591 , (William Shakespeare), Henry VI part 2 :
(obsolete) Cleverly made; artfully contrived.
* 1667 , (John Milton), Paradise Lost , Book IX:
* 1596 , (Edmund Spenser), The Faerie Queene , IV.4:
* 1808 , (Walter Scott), Marmion XX:
* 1924 , Time , 17 Nov 1924:
(obsolete) Overly discriminating or needlessly meticulous; fastidious; prim.
* 1590 , (Edmund Spenser), The Faerie Queene , III.7:
Pleasingly unusual; especially, having old-fashioned charm.
* 1815 , (Jane Austen), Emma :
* 2011 , Ian Sample, The Guardian , 31 Jan 2011:
(archaic) The vulva.
* c. 1390 , Geoffrey Chaucer, "The Wife of Bath's Tale", Canterbury Tales :
* 2003 , Peter Ackroyd, The Clerkenwell Tales , p. 9:
(lb) Fastidious, particular; demanding a high standard of excellence, difficult to satisfy.
*1612 , , Proceedings of the English Colonie in Virginia , in Kupperman 1988, p.172:
*:But departing thence, when we found no houses, we were not curious in any weather, to lie 3 or 4 nights together upon any shore under the trees by a good fire.
*(Thomas Fuller) (1606-1661)
*:little curious in her clothes
Inquisitive; tending to ask questions, investigate, or explore.
:
Prompted by curiosity.
*1590 , (Edmund Spenser), (The Faerie Queene) , III.ix:
*:But he to shift their curious request, / Gan causen, why she could not come in place.
Unusual; odd; out of the ordinary; bizarre.
:
*
*:Captain Edward Carlisle, soldier as he was, martinet as he was, felt a curious sensation of helplessness seize upon him as he met her steady gaze, her alluring smile?; he could not tell what this prisoner might do.
(lb) Exhibiting care or nicety; artfully constructed; elaborate; wrought with elegance or skill.
*(Bible), (w) xxxv.32
*:to devise curious works
*(William Shakespeare) (c.1564–1616)
*:his body couched in a curious bed
Quaint is a related term of curious.
As adjectives the difference between quaint and curious
is that quaint is (obsolete) of a person: cunning, crafty while curious is (lb) fastidious, particular; demanding a high standard of excellence, difficult to satisfy.As a noun quaint
is (archaic) the vulva.quaint
English
Etymology 1
From (etyl) cointe, (queinte) et al., (etyl) .Adjective
(er)- But you, my Lord, were glad to be imploy'd, / To shew how queint an Orator you are.
- describe races and games, / Or tilting furniture, imblazon'd shields, / Impresses quaint , caparisons and steeds, / Bases and tinsel trappings [...].
- 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 […].
- Lord Gifford, deep beneath the ground, / Heard Alexander's bugle sound, / And tarried not his garb to change, / But, in his wizard habit strange, / Came forth,—a quaint and fearful sight!
- 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.
- 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 [...].
- I admire all that quaint , old-fashioned politeness; it is much more to my taste than modern ease; modern ease often disgusts me.
- The rock is a haven for rare wildlife, a landscape where pretty hedgerows and quaint villages are bordered by a breathtaking, craggy coastline.
Synonyms
* See alsoDerived terms
* quaintly * quaintnessEtymology 2
A variant of cunt (possibly as a pun).Noun
(en noun)- And trewely, as myne housbondes tolde me, / I hadde þe beste queynte þat myghte be.
- 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.’