Free TranslationFree Translation
Synonyms, antonyms, pronunciation

  Home
English Dictionary      examples: 'day', 'get rid of', 'New York Bay'




Delicacy   /dˈɛləkəsi/  /dˈɛlɪkəsi/   Listen
noun
Delicacy  n.  (pl. delicacies)  
1.
The state or condition of being delicate; agreeableness to the senses; delightfulness; as, delicacy of flavor, of odor, and the like. "What choice to choose for delicacy best."
2.
Nicety or fineness of form, texture, or constitution; softness; elegance; smoothness; tenderness; and hence, frailty or weakness; as, the delicacy of a fiber or a thread; delicacy of a hand or of the human form; delicacy of the skin; delicacy of frame.
3.
Nice propriety of manners or conduct; susceptibility or tenderness of feeling; refinement; fastidiousness; and hence, in an exaggerated sense, effeminacy; as, great delicacy of behavior; delicacy in doing a kindness; delicacy of character that unfits for earnest action. "You know your mother's delicacy in this point."
4.
Addiction to pleasure; luxury; daintiness; indulgence; luxurious or voluptuous treatment. "And to those dainty limbs which Nature lent For gentle usage and soft delicacy?"
5.
Nice and refined perception and discrimination; critical niceness; fastidious accuracy. "That Augustan delicacy of taste which is the boast of the great public schools of England."
6.
The state of being affected by slight causes; sensitiveness; as, the delicacy of a chemist's balance.
7.
That which is alluring, delicate, or refined; a luxury or pleasure; something pleasant to the senses, especially to the sense of taste; a dainty; as, delicacies of the table. "The merchants of the earth are waxed rich through the abundance of her delicacies."
8.
Pleasure; gratification; delight. (Obs.) "He Rome brent for his delicacie."
Synonyms: See Dainty.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








Advanced search
     Find words:
Starting with
Ending with
Containing
Matching a pattern  

Synonyms
Antonyms
Quotes
Words linked to  

only single words



Share |





"Delicacy" Quotes from Famous Books



... medium stature, slender and lissome, looking taller than she really was. Her features were chiselled with exquisite delicacy; her hair of a raven blackness, and eyes of that dark lustre which reappears for generations in the descendants of Europeans who have mingled their blood with that of the aborigines of the forest. The Indian eye is preserved as an heirloom, long after all memory of the red stain has vanished ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby

... some impetuosity as Philip went on speaking; the words were evidently an outlet for some immediate feeling of his own, as well as an answer to Maggie. There was a pain pressing on him at that moment. He shrank with proud delicacy from the faintest allusion to the words of love, of plighted love that had passed between them. It would have seemed to him like reminding Maggie of a promise; it would have had for him something of the baseness of compulsion. He could not dwell on the fact that ...
— The Mill on the Floss • George Eliot

... he says, "and they had no delicacy of feature; the younger, who may have been eighteen years of age, had a frightful ulcer upon her leg. Many of these islanders were covered with sores, which may have been the commencement of leprosy; for I noticed two men, whose ulcerated and swollen legs left no doubt as ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part 2. The Great Navigators of the Eighteenth Century • Jules Verne

... my child, and since I came here I have heard-of you," he finished, with innate delicacy. Indeed, who had ...
— Down the Mother Lode • Vivia Hemphill

... the man to be carelessly or poorly told. The imaginary landscapes and visions of the most ecstatic dreamer can never rival such recollections, told simply perhaps, but still told (as they could not fail to be) with precision, delicacy, and evident delight. They are too much loved by the author not to be palated by the reader. But beyond the mere felicity of pencil, the nature of the piece could never fail to move my heart. When I read his essay "On the Past and Future," ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XXII (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson


More quotes...



Copyright © 2025 e-Free Translation.com