comely
Americanadjective
-
pleasing in appearance; attractive; fair.
a comely face.
- Synonyms:
- personable, good-looking, beautiful, handsome, pretty
-
comely behavior.
adjective
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of comely
First recorded before 1000; Middle English cumli, Old English cȳmlīc “lovely,” equivalent to cȳme “exquisite” (cognate with Middle High German kūme “weak, tender,” German kaum (adverb) “with difficulty,” Old High German kūmo ) + -līc -ly
Explanation
Comely means attractive or appropriate. A comely girl is pretty. A comely hairstyle is flattering. If your manners are comely, it means you know the right way to act to put people at their ease. Comely is related to the word becoming, in the sense of something's being attractive and appropriate––you're comely wearing that becoming blouse, the way she told the story was becoming to a comely young lady. Comely is the opposite of the similar-looking homely, which means plain-looking, almost ugly.
Vocabulary lists containing comely
"The Bet" by Anton Chekhov
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The Picture of Dorian Gray
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Much Ado About Nothing
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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.
See Examples For:
As for the pictures, they’re shrouded in ominous shadows, but although the raven’s eyes burn like embers, the bird does nothing worse than cry “nevermore,” and Lenore, when she appears, looks downright comely.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 9, 2025
Was she too fancy to have her dental work performed by a comely rattlesnake in the Badlands, as is custom in South Dakota?
From Slate ● Mar. 16, 2024
The bit was funny enough, but I was aware while watching it that it wouldn't have worked at all if Colbert had been putting a comely actress through the paces.
From Salon ● Mar. 30, 2023
Love blooms between a sympathetic attorney and the comely shoplifter he has taken home for the Christmas holiday.
From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 13, 2019
The old man ... no one would ever think him comely.
From "A Dance with Dragons" by George R. R. Martin
It was like a Louis C. K. bit in a much comelier frame.
From New York Times ● Nov. 9, 2012
Colby dreamed of moving to a comelier, 650-acre site on Mayflower Hill, outside Waterville.
From Time Magazine Archive
“That’s like her. Well, you look it,” and Jo’s eye plainly betrayed that she found her boy comelier than ever.
From "Little Women" by Louisa May Alcott
The unnamed peaks towering over the glacier were bigger and comelier and infinitely more menacing than they would have been were I in the company of another person.
From "Into the Wild" by Jon Krakauer
But if you are anxious to match your girls with the comelier women of other countries—you have a perfectly clean palette, as my old friend Charles Dana Gibson would put it.
From The Awful Australian by Desmond, Valerie
The phantom that haunts the eccentric Japanese rock opera “Inu-oh” is not the comeliest of creatures — not at first, anyway.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 11, 2022
Since then the Misses Spencer, whose news value is not lessened by the fact that they are two of Chicago's comeliest young girls, have been well publicized by their headline-hunting parent.
From Time Magazine Archive
In Die Meistersinger last week the Eva was one of the comeliest young women who has ever made an operatic debut.
From Time Magazine Archive
And the chorus whom these trappings adorn are the comeliest that have stretched the necks of metropolitan audiences this year.
From Time Magazine Archive
Her suitor now, the comeliest of the train, Was Turnus, sprung from an illustrious strain.
From The Æneid of Virgil Translated into English Verse by E. Fairfax Taylor by Taylor, Edward Fairfax
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.
