feminine
/ˈfɛmɪnɪn/
Word Rarity
Rare
Frequency: 3.91 in modern English
13
Scrabble Score
8
Letters
3
Syllables
5
Unique Chars
Meaning
adj
Of or pertaining to the female gender.
adj
Of or pertaining to the female sex; biologically female, not male.
adj
Having the qualities stereotypically associated with women: nurturing, not aggressive, sensual; womanly.
adj
Of, pertaining or belonging to the female grammatical gender, in languages that have gender distinctions.
adj
Of, pertaining or belonging to the female grammatical gender, in languages that have gender distinctions.
adj
Having the vowel harmony of a front vowel.
adj
Following or ending on an unstressed syllable.
Example Sentences
- "Mary, Elizabeth, and Edith are feminine names."
- "Her heavenly form Angelic, but more soft and feminine."
- "Her letters are remarkably deficient in feminine ease and grace."
- "Ninias being esteemed no man of warre at all, but altogether feminine, and subject to ease and delicacy."
- "Women's names were formed in the same way as men's, but with feminine terminations […]"
- "Feminine caesura, feminine catalexis, feminine ending, feminine rhyme."
Etymology
Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *dʰeh₁(y)-der. Proto-Indo-European *dʰeh₁-m̥h₁n-éh₂ Proto-Italic *θēmanā Proto-Italic *fēmanā Latin fēmina Proto-Indo-European *-nós Proto-Indo-European *-iHnos Proto-Italic *-īnos Latin -īnus Latin fēminīnusder. Old French femininbor. Middle English femynyne English feminine From Middle English feminine, femynyne, femynyn, from Old French feminin, feminine, from Latin fēminīnus, from fēmina (“woman”), from Proto-Indo-European *dʰeh₁-m̥h₁n-eh₂ (“(the one) nursing, breastfeeding”). Related to fetus, feminism, filial, fellatio.
Origin
Word Breakdown
Usage
Inflected Forms
more feminine (comparative)
most feminine (superlative)
f. (alternative, abbreviation)
f (alternative, abbreviation)
fœminine (alternative, hypercorrect)
femenine (alternative, misspelling)
feminines (plural)