compliment
/ˈkɑmpləmənt/
Word Rarity
Rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 3.91 in modern English
18
Scrabble Score
10
Letters
3
Syllables
9
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
An expression of praise, congratulation, or respect.
noun
verb
Example Sentences
- "pay someone a compliment"
- "[…] I met him With customary compliment; when he, Wafting his eyes to the contrary and falling A lip of much contempt, speeds from me and So leaves me to consider what is breeding That changeth thus his manners."
- "[...] what honour that, but tedious waste of time, to sit and hear So many hollow compliments and lies, Outlandish flatteries?"
- "Virtue indeed meets many a rhiming friend, And many a compliment politely penn’d,"
- "He told the Captain, He was heartily sorry for his Misfortunes; tho’ in my Opinion that was nothing but a Compliment: For, as I found afterwards, he was more brutish, and dishonest, than most of the other Kings on the Island […]"
- "This accomplished man condescended to think of a young girl, and take the pains to talk to her, not with absurd compliment, but with an appeal to her understanding, and sometimes with instructive correction."
Etymology
Origin
- Source language: French
Word Breakdown
- Root: compliment, complimento, cumplimiento, complēmentum, complimenter
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /ˈkɑmpləmənt/
- British English: /ˈkɒmplɪmənt/