couth

[kooth]Facetious.

SEE MORE SYNONYMS FOR couth ON THESAURUS.COM

adjective

showing or having good manners or sophistication; smooth: Sending her flowers would be a very couth thing to do.

noun

good manners; refinement: to be lacking in couth.

Origin of couth

First recorded in 1895–1900; back formation from uncouth

couth

[kooth]

adjective Archaic.

known or acquainted with.

Origin of couth

before 1000; Middle English, Old English cūth past participle of cunnan to know¹ (see can², could)

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2019

Related Words for couth

practical, refined, worldly, mature, glistening, smooth, urbane, bright, shiny, burnished, knowing, disenchanted, experienced, practiced, jaded, cultivated, disillusioned, seasoned, studied, bored

Examples from the Web for couth

Historical Examples of couth

Al myten o 25 same inges bettere and more plentiuousely be couth 592 in e moue of e poeple at knowe al is.
Chaucer's Translation of Boethius's 'De Consolatione Philosophiae'
Geoffrey Chaucer
Al myten o same inges bettere and more plentiuousely be couth in e moue of e poeple at knowe al is.
Chaucer's Translation of Boethius's 'De Consolatione Philosophiae'
Geoffrey Chaucer

British Dictionary definitions for couth

couth

adjective

facetious refined

archaic familiar; known

Word Origin for couth

Old English cūth known, past participle of cunnan to know; sense 1, back formation from uncouth

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 couth

adj.

Old English cuðe "known," past participle of cunnan (see can (v.1)), from Proto-Germanic *kunthaz (cf. Old Frisian kuth "known," Old Saxon cuth, Old High German kund, German kund, Gothic kunþs "known").

Died out as such 16c. with the emergence of could, but the old word was reborn 1896, with a new sense of "cultured, refined," as a back-formation from uncouth (q.v.). The Old English word forms the first element in the man's proper name Cuthbert, literally "famous-bright."