douceur

[doo-sur, doo-sœr]

noun

plural

douceurs 

1. a gratuity; tip.

2. a conciliatory gift or bribe.

3. Archaic.,  sweetness or agreeableness.

douceur

/ duːˈsɜː, dusœr /

noun

1. a gratuity, tip, or bribe

2. sweetness

Word History and Origins

Origin of douceur¹

1350–1400; Middle English < Middle French: sweetness < Late Latin dulcor, with initial syllable reshaped under influence of French doux, douce; douce, -eur

Word History and Origins

Origin of douceur¹

C17: from French, from Late Latin dulcor, from Latin dulcis sweet

Example Sentences

Toynbee writes that in addition to employing more police and military to control crime and prevent the “powder-keg” from exploding, governments decided “to pay its metropolitan proletariat a dole as a douceur”—a soothing handout—“for keeping quiet.”

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In France, however, she had more lasting success as a singer, with hits including “Les Vendanges de l’Amour,” “Que Calor la Vida,” “Viens Viens” and covers of Bob Dylan’s “Blowin’ in the Wind,” Simon and Garfunkel’s “The Sound of Silence” and the Rolling Stones’s “Paint It Black,” retitled “Marie Douceur, Marie Colère.”

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And in August 2011, when 58-year-old Renee-Nicole Douceur, winter manager at the station, suffered a stroke, NSF deemed it unsafe to send in a rescue plane.

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Despite pleas from family members, a petition to the White House, and numerous media stories, Douceur remained at the South Pole for 2 months until she finally caught a ride out on a scheduled cargo plane.

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Nonetheless, an otherwise rollicking chapter on the Frankfurt Book Fair gradually saddens into an elegy for the douceur de vivre before the Revolution.

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