canaille
Americannoun
noun
Etymology
Origin of canaille
1670–80; < French < Italian canaglia pack of dogs, equivalent to can ( e ) dog (< Latin canis ) + -aglia collective suffix
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
He knew nothing of that silent middle class that struggled between genteel poverty and the impossible desire of emulating the golden canaille to which he himself belonged.
From "The House of the Spirits: A Novel" by Isabel Allende
When I am in the bill at Les ambassadeurs, the place is always full of English—my songs are canaille, aren't they? really canaille.
From Woman and Artist by O'Rell, Max
The enemies of the church are to be found almost exclusively in the bourgeoisie, and still more in the canaille, of that literature.
From The Philosophy of History, Vol. 1 of 2 by Schlegel, Friedrich
"All canaille, but--not all like that, or we had some strange bed-fellows indeed!"
From The Abbess Of Vlaye by Weyman, Stanley J.
He had with him as his chamber-moor his long, lean dispenser, who in the adjoining drinking-room encountered the very short dispenser of the second apothecary's-shop, or shop of the canaille.
From Hesperus or Forty-Five Dog-Post-Days Vol. I. A Biography by Jean Paul
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
