prose
- the ordinary form of spoken or written language, without metrical structure, as distinguished from poetry or verse.
- matter-of-fact, commonplace, or dull expression, quality, discourse, etc.
- Liturgy. a hymn sung after the gradual, originating from a practice of setting words to the jubilatio of the alleluia.
- of, in, or pertaining to prose.
- commonplace; dull; prosaic.
- to turn into or express in prose.
- to write or talk in a dull, matter-of-fact manner.
Origin of prose
Examples from the Web for proses
Historical Examples
The Proses contain the main arguments; the Metres serve for embellishment and recreation.
Chaucer's Works, Volume 2 (of 7)Geoffrey Chaucer
prose
- spoken or written language as in ordinary usage, distinguished from poetry by its lack of a marked metrical structure
- a passage set for translation into a foreign language
- commonplace or dull discourse, expression, etc
- RC Church a hymn recited or sung after the gradual at Mass
- (modifier) written in prose
- (modifier) matter-of-fact
- to write or say (something) in prose
- (intr) to speak or write in a tedious style
Word Origin
Word Origin and History for proses
prose
n.
c.1300, "story, narration," from Old French prose (13c.), from Latin prosa oratio "straightforward or direct speech" (without the ornaments of verse), from prosa, fem. of prosus, earlier prorsus "straightforward, direct," from Old Latin provorsus "(moving) straight ahead," from pro- "forward" (see pro-) + vorsus "turned," past participle of vertere "to turn" (see verse).
"Good prose, to say nothing of the original thoughts it conveys, may be infinitely varied in modulation. It is only an extension of metres, an amplification of harmonies, of which even the best and most varied poetry admits but few." [Walter Savage Landor, "Imaginary Conversations"]
Meaning "prose writing; non-poetry" is from mid-14c. The sense of "dull or commonplace expression" is from 1680s, out of earlier sense "plain expression" (1560s). Those who lament the want of an English agent noun to correspond to poet might try prosaist (1776), proser (1620s), or Frenchified prosateur (1880), though the first two in their day also acquired in English the secondary sense "dull writer."