noblesse
See also: Noblesse
English
Etymology
From Anglo-Norman noblesse, noblesce et al., Old French noblace, nobleche et al., from noble (“noble”).
Pronunciation
- (UK) IPA(key): /nə(ʊ)ˈblɛs/
Noun
noblesse (usually uncountable, plural noblesses)
- The quality of being noble; nobleness.
- c. 1395, Geoffrey Chaucer, ‘The Clerk's Tale’, The Canterbury Tales, Ellesmere ms:
- I yow took/ out of youre pouere array / And putte yow / in estaat of heigh noblesse.
- 1485, Sir Thomas Malory, chapter x, in Le Morte Darthur, book XIX:
- his moder had discouerd in her pryde / how she had wroughte that by enchauntement / soo that he shold neuer be hole vntyl the best knyghte of the world had serched his woundes / […] / And yf I fayle to hele hym here in this land I wylle neuer take more payne vpon me / and that is pyte for he was a good knyghte and of grete noblenes
- (Can we find and add a quotation of Ben Jonson to this entry?)
- c. 1395, Geoffrey Chaucer, ‘The Clerk's Tale’, The Canterbury Tales, Ellesmere ms:
- The nobility; peerage.
- 1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, I.8:
- Faire braunch of noblesse, flowre of cheualrie, / That with your worth the world amazed make, / How shall I quite the paines, ye suffer for my sake?
- (Can we find and add a quotation of John Dryden to this entry?)
- 1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, I.8:
French
Etymology
Old French, see noble + -esse
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /nɔblɛs/
Further reading
- “noblesse” in le Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).
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