feminine
adjective
- having qualities associated with females or femaleness
- grammatical gender, as opposed to masculine
noun
- grammatical gender
Wiktionary
Pronunciation: /ˈfɛmɪnɪn/ / /ˈfɛmənɪn/
adj
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.
- Of or pertaining to the female gender.
- Of or pertaining to the female sex; biologically female, not male.
- Belonging to females; typically used by females.
“Mary, Elizabeth, and Edith are feminine names.”
- Having the qualities stereotypically associated with women: nurturing, not aggressive, sensual; womanly.
“Her heavenly form Angelic, but more soft and feminine.”
“Her letters are remarkably deficient in feminine ease and grace.”
- Of, pertaining or belonging to the female grammatical gender, in languages that have gender distinctions.
- Of, pertaining or belonging to the female grammatical gender, in languages that have gender distinctions.
“Women's names were formed in the same way as men's, but with feminine terminations […]”
- Having the vowel harmony of a front vowel.
- Following or ending on an unstressed syllable.
“Feminine caesura, feminine catalexis, feminine ending, feminine rhyme.”
noun
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.
- That which is feminine.
- A woman.
“They guide the feminines toward the Pallace.”
- The feminine gender.
- A word of the feminine gender.
“These changes being understood, it is easy to see how inaccurate it is to talk of she being the feminine, and they being the plural, of he. The different words belong to different systems, and are no more the masculines and feminines of one another, than (to use a well-known illustration) puss is the vocative case of cat.”