embonpoint

embonpoint

English

WOTD – 10 June 2011

Etymology

Borrowed from French embonpoint.

Pronunciation

• enPR: äɴbôɴpwĕɴ, IPA^(key): /ɑ̃bɔ̃pwɛ̃/

  • Audio (UK)

    (file)

Noun

embonpoint (countable and uncountable, plural embonpoints)

1. Plumpness, stoutness, especially when voluptuous.
   • 1911, J.M. Barrie, Peter and Wendy:

     She was slightly inclined to embonpoint.

   • 1922 February, James Joyce, Ulysses, Paris: Shakespeare and Company, […], OCLC 560090630:

     The beautiful woman threw off her sabletrimmed wrap, displaying her queenly shoulders and heaving embonpoint.

   • 2002, Colin Jones, The Great Nation, Penguin 2003, p. 1:

     The patient's physicians had always allowed him to indulge a gargantuan appetite, countering his intake and regulating his embonpoint by a heroic diet of purges and enemas.

Translations

plumpness

Finnish: muodokkuus French: embonpoint (fr) m Russian: полнота́ (ru) f (polnotá), дородность (ru) f (dorodnostʹ) Serbo-Croatian: punašnost (sh)

Adjective

embonpoint (comparative more embonpoint, superlative most embonpoint)

1. Plump, chubby, buxom.
   • 1834, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], Francesca Carrara. […], volume I, London: Richard Bentley, […], (successor to Henry Colburn), OCLC 630079698, page 294:

     "Though it is six years since I have seen you," exclaimed Anne, "you are not the least altered; instead of that, you are handsomer than ever; your being rather more embonpoint suits you, and your complexion is brilliant to a degree."

   Synonyms: see Thesaurus:overweight, Thesaurus:voluptuous

Translations

plump, chubby, buxom

Finnish: muodokas (fi) Japanese: ぽっちゃり (pocchari) Russian: по́лный (ru) (pólnyj), дородный (ru) (dorodnyj) Serbo-Croatian: pun (sh), punašan (sh) Spanish: rechoncho (es), rollizo (es)

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French

Etymology

Univerbation of en bon point.

The rule in French is to write /n/ as /m/ in front of /m, p/ or /b/ - here the rule is applied to the first /n/ but not the second since the rule does not apply to the words derived from bon : bonbon, bonbonne and bonbonnière.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ɑ̃.bɔ̃.pwɛ̃/

• Audio

  (file)

Noun

embonpoint m (plural embonpoints)

1. plumpness, stoutness

   Synonyms: obésité, surpoids

   • 1844, Honoré de Balzac, Modeste Mignon:

     Quoique La Brière fût alors mince, il appartient à ce genre de tempéraments qui, formés tard, prennent à trente ans un embonpoint inattendu.

     (please add an English translation of this quote)

   • 1924, Emmanuel Bove, Mes Amis‎:

     La patronne s’appelle Lucie Dunois. Son nom, en majuscules d’émail, est cimenté au vitrage de la devanture. Il manque trois lettres. Lucie a l’embonpoint d’un buveur de bière.

     (please add an English translation of this quote)

Further reading

• “embonpoint”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

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Swedish

Alternative forms

• embonpoäng

Etymology

Borrowed from French embonpoint.

Noun

embonpoint c

1. embonpoint

Declension

Declension of embonpoint
	Uncountable
	Indefinite	Definite
Nominative	embonpoint	embonpointen	—	—
Genitive	embonpoints	embonpointens	—	—

References

• embonpoint in Svenska Akademiens ordlista (SAOL)
• embonpoint in Svensk ordbok (SO)
• embonpoint in Svenska Akademiens ordbok (SAOB)