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accolade

[ak-uh-leyd, -lahd; ak-uh-leyd, -lahd]

noun

any award, honor, or laudatory notice: The play received accolades from the press.
a light touch on the shoulder with the flat side of the sword or formerly by an embrace, done in the ceremony of conferring knighthood.
the ceremony itself.
Music. a brace joining several staves.
Architecture.
  1. an archivolt or hood molding having more or less the form of an ogee arch.
  2. a decoration having more or less the form of an ogee arch, cut into a lintel or flat arch.

Origin of accolade

1615–25; < French, derivative of a(c)colée embrace (with -ade -ade1), noun use of feminine past participle of a(c)coler, Old French verbal derivative of col neck (see collar) with a- a-5
Related formsac·co·lad·ed, adjective
Can be confusedaccoladed accolated
Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2019
British Dictionary definitions for accoladed

accolade

noun

strong praise or approval; acclaim
an award or honour
the ceremonial gesture used to confer knighthood, originally an embrace, now a touch on the shoulder with a sword
a rare word for brace (def. 7)
architect a curved ornamental moulding, esp one having the shape of an ogee arch

Word Origin for accolade

C17: via French and Italian from Vulgar Latin accollāre (unattested) to hug; related to Latin collum neck
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
Word Origin and History for accoladed

accolade

n.

1620s, from French accolade (16c.), from Provençal acolada or Italian accollata, ultimately from noun use of a fem. past participle from Vulgar Latin *accollare "to embrace around the neck," from Latin ad- "to" (see ad-) + collum "neck" (see collar (n.)).

The original sense is of an embrace about the neck or the tapping of a sword on the shoulders to confer knighthood. Extended meaning "praise, award" is from 1852. Also see -ade. Earlier was accoll (mid-14c.), from Old French acolee "an embrace, kiss, especially that given to a new-made knight," from verb acoler. The French noun in the 16c. was transformed to accolade, with the foreign suffix.

Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper