douce

See also: ďouče

English

Etymology

From Middle English douce, from Old French dolz, dous, Middle French doux, douce, from Latin dulcis (“sweet”). Doublet of dolce, doux, and dulce.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /duːs/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -uːs

Adjective

douce (comparative more douce, superlative most douce)

1. (obsolete) Sweet; nice; pleasant.
2. (dialect) Serious and quiet; steady, not flighty or casual; sober.
   • 1919, Christopher Morley, The Haunted Bookshop‎^[1], New York, N.Y.: Grosset & Dunlap Publishers, →OCLC, page 242:

     The bookseller, douce man, had seen too many eccentric customers to be shocked by the vehemence of his questioner.

   • 1932, Lewis Grassic Gibbon, Sunset Song (A Scots Quair), Polygon, published 2006, page 27:

     what would you say of a man with plenty of silver that bided all by his lone and made his own bed and did his own baking when he might have had a wife to make him douce and brave?

   • 1992, Hilary Mantel, A Place of Greater Safety, Harper Perennial, published 2007, page 145:

     If Fabre, for example, were elected to the Academy tomorrow, you would see his lust for social revolution turning overnight into the most douce and debonair conformity.

   • 1996, Alasdair Gray, “The Story of a Recluse”, in Every Short Story 1951-2012, Canongate, published 2012, page 271:

     So what strong lord of misrule can preside in this douce, commercially respectable, late 19th century city where even religious fanaticism reinforces un adventurous mediocrity?

Derived terms

• doucely
• douceness

Related terms

• powder-douce

French

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /dus/

• Audio (France, Brétigny-sur-Orge):

  (file)

• Audio (France, Mulhouse):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -us

Adjective

douce

1. feminine singular of doux

Anagrams

• coude, coudé

Middle English

Alternative forms

• douse, dowce, dowse

Etymology

Borrowed from Old French dous, dolz, douce, from Latin dulcem.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /duːs/

Adjective

douce

1. pleasant, sweet, nice, kind
2. sweet to the taste

Derived terms

• doucen
• doucet
• dousour
• egurdouce

Descendants

• English: douce
• Scots: douce

References

• “dǒuce, adj. & n.”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007, retrieved 2018-07-11.

Noun

douce

1. (rare) lover

References

• “dǒuce, adj. & n.”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007, retrieved 2018-07-11.