winsome
/ˈwɪn.səm/
Word Rarity
Very rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 2.39 in modern English
12
Scrabble Score
7
Letters
2
Syllables
7
Unique Chars
Meaning
Example Sentences
- "[…] lifting her winsome eyes to my face with that sort of look which turns off bad temper, even when one has all the right in the world to indulge it."
- "Will ye keep your troth to me, / Winsome Annie Ramsay? / Will ye keep your troth to me, / Winsome Annie Ramsay? / Will ye keep your troth to me? / My ain true luve will ye be? / Then meet me at the trysting tree, / Winsome Annie Ramsay."
- "Gerty MacDowell who was seated near her companions, lost in thought, gazing far away into the distance was in very truth as fair a specimen of winsome Irish girlhood as one could wish to see."
- "He [Ching Keng Lee] is a man of fine physique and above the height of the average Straits-born, with a shrewd business head, and affable and winsome manners, and continues to take a keen interest in public affairs."
- "The pink wallpaper of the nursery was decorated with a Noah's Ark of friendly lions and comical giraffes and winsome elephants."
- "“We have to begin to step up and communicate this message in ways that are winsome and compelling,” he added."
Etymology
Inherited from Middle English wynsom, winsom, winsome, winsum, wunsum (“beautiful; agreeable, gracious, pleasant; generous; of situations: favourable, propitious”), from Old English wynsum (“joyful, merry, pleasant; winsome”), from Proto-West Germanic *wunnjusam (“joyful”). By surface analysis, winne (“delight, joy, pleasure”) + -some.
Origin
Word Breakdown
- Root: *wenh₁-, wynsom, wynsum, *wunnjusam