douceur

American  

[doo-sur, doo-sœr] / duˈsɜr, duˈsœr /

noun

plural

douceurs

1. a gratuity; tip.

2. a conciliatory gift or bribe.

3. Archaic. sweetness or agreeableness.

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douceur British  

/ duːˈsɜː, dusœr /

noun

1. a gratuity, tip, or bribe

2. sweetness

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Etymology

Origin of douceur

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

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.”

From The Wall Street Journal

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.”

From Washington Post

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.

From Science Magazine

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.

From Science Magazine

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

From Washington Post