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Vulgar vs Gaudy - What's the difference?

vulgar | gaudy |

As adjectives the difference between vulgar and gaudy

is that vulgar is debased, uncouth, distasteful, obscene while gaudy is very showy or ornamented, now especially when excessive, or in a tasteless or vulgar manner.

As a noun gaudy is

one of the large beads in the rosary at which the paternoster is recited or gaudy can be a reunion held by one of the colleges of the university of oxford for alumni, normally held during the summer vacations.

vulgar

English

Adjective

(en-adj)
  • Debased, uncouth, distasteful, obscene.
  • * {{quote-book
  • , year= 1551 , year_published= 1888 , author= , by= , title= A New English Dictionary on Historical Principles: Founded Mainly on the Materials Collected by the Philological Society. , url= http://books.google.com/books?id=JmpXAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA217 , original= , chapter= , section= Part 1 , isbn= , edition= , publisher= Clarendon Press , location= Oxford , editor= , volume= 1 , page= 217 , passage= Also the rule of false position, with dyuers examples not onely vulgar , but some appertaynyng to the rule of Algeber. }}
  • * The construction worker made a vulgar suggestion to the girls walking down the street.
  • (classical sense) Having to do with ordinary, common people.
  • * Bishop Fell
  • It might be more useful to the English reader to write in our vulgar language.
  • * Bancroft
  • The mechanical process of multiplying books had brought the New Testament in the vulgar tongue within the reach of every class.
  • * 1860 , G. Syffarth, "A Remarkable Seal in Dr. Abbott's Museum at New York", Transactions of the Academy of Science of St. Louis? , age 265
  • Further, the same sacred name in other monuments precedes the vulgar name of King Takellothis , the sixth of the XXII. Dyn., as we have seen.

    Synonyms

    * (obscene) inappropriate, obscene, debased, uncouth, offensive, ignoble, mean, profane * (ordinary) common, ordinary, popular

    Derived terms

    * (obscene) vulgarity * (ordinary) vulgar fraction, vulgate, Vulgate * vulgar fraction

    gaudy

    English

    Etymology 1

    Origin uncertain; perhaps from . A common claim that the word derives from , is not supported by evidence (the word was in use at least half a century before Gaudí was born).

    Adjective

    (er)
  • very showy or ornamented, now especially when excessive, or in a tasteless or vulgar manner
  • * Shakespeare
  • Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy, / But not expressed in fancy; rich, not gaudy .
  • * 1813 , , Pride and Prejudice
  • The rooms were lofty and handsome, and their furniture suitable to the fortune of its proprietor; but Elizabeth saw, with admiration of his taste, that it was neither gaudy nor uselessly fine; with less of splendour, and more real elegance, than the furniture of Rosings.
  • * 1887 , Homer Greene, Burnham Breaker
  • A large gaudy , flowing cravat, and an ill-used silk hat, set well back on the wearer's head, completed this somewhat noticeable costume.
  • * 2005 , Thomas Hauser & Marilyn Cole Lownes, "How Bling-bling Took Over the Ring", The Observer , 9 January 2005
  • Gaudy jewellery might offend some people's sense of style. But former heavyweight champion and grilling-machine entrepreneur George Foreman is philosophical about today's craze for bling-bling.
  • (obsolete) gay; merry; festive
  • (Tennyson)
  • * Shakespeare
  • Let's have one other gaudy night.
  • * Twain
  • And then, there he was, slim and handsome, and dressed the gaudiest and prettiest you ever saw...
    Synonyms
    * (excessively showy) tawdry, flashy, garish, kitschy *
    Derived terms
    * gaudily * gaudy night

    Noun

    (gaudies)
  • One of the large beads in the rosary at which the paternoster is recited.
  • (Gower)

    Etymology 2

    From Latin gaudium "joy".

    Noun

    (gaudies)
  • A reunion held by one of the colleges of the University of Oxford for alumni, normally held during the summer vacations.