fleur

fleur (plural fleurs)

1. A fleur-de-lys.

From Old French flur, flour, flor, from Latin flōrem, accusative of flōs (“flower; the finest part of something”), from Proto-Italic *flōs, from Proto-Indo-European *bʰleh₃- (“flower, blossom”), from *bʰel- (“to bloom”).

• IPA^(key): /flœʁ/

• Audio (Western France)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -œʁ

An example of epibolium flowers (fleurs d’épilobes)

fleur f (plural fleurs)

1. (botany) Flower; bloom; blossom; collectively, the reproductive organs and the envelope which surrounds them in angiosperms (also called "flowering plants").

   Je suis allé cueillir une fleur dans les champs.

   I went to pick a flower in the fields.

   Il m’a offert de magnifiques fleurs.

   He offered me magnificent flowers.

2. (by metonymy) Flowering plant; angiosperm; the plant with flowers itself.

   Les orchidées sont des fleurs recherchées.

   Orchids are sought-after flowers.

3. (figuratively) A kind favor given by one person to another.

   Il m’a fait une fleur.

   He gave me a kind favor.

4. (figuratively) The best of something.

   Voici la fine fleur de la jeunesse française.

   Here's the cream of the crop of French youth.

   Mourir à la fleur de l’âge.

   to die in the prime of life

5. (by metaphor) The virginity of a woman.
   • Jean de la Fontaine, Fables

     Il est bon de garder sa fleur ; mais pour l’avoir perdue il ne se faut pas pendre.

     It is wise to guard one's blossom, but to have lost it one should not hang.

6. (archaic, chemistry) Substances with a state of purity or extreme separation, produced by sublimation.

   Fleurs de soufre, de zinc, d’arsenic, d’antimoine.

   refinements of sulfur, zinc, arsenic, antimony

• (flowering plant): angiosperme
• (kind favor): aide, faveur, service
• (best of something): crème de la crème, élite, gratin, meilleur, nec plus ultra
• (virginity): vertu, virginité

• (flower, bloom, blossom): arbre, inflorescence, capitule, ombelle, plante

• (flower, bloom, blossom): bractée, carpelle, étamine, fleuron, pédoncule, pétale, pistil, sépale, tépale

• (flower, bloom, blossom): androcée, calice, corolle, gynécée, involucre, périgone, périanthe, réceptacle floral

• effleurer
• efflorescence
• efflorescent
• fleuret
• fleureté
• floraison
• floral
• flore
• passiflore
• quadriflore
• uniflore

• “fleur” in le Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

Borrowing from late Old French fleur.

fleur (plural fleurs)

1. flower

From Old French flor, flur, from Latin flōs, flōrem, from Proto-Indo-European *bʰleh₃- (“flower, blossom”).

fleur f (plural fleurs)

1. (botany) flower