quaint

[kweynt]

adjective

quainter, quaintest 

1. having an old-fashioned attractiveness or charm; oddly picturesque.

   a quaint old house.

   Synonyms: archaic, antiquated

2. strange, peculiar, or unusual in an interesting, pleasing, or amusing way.

   a quaint sense of humor.

   Synonyms: uncommon, curious
   Antonyms: ordinary

3. skillfully or cleverly made.

4. Obsolete.,  wise; skilled.

quaint

/ kweɪnt /

adjective

1. attractively unusual, esp in an old-fashioned style

   a quaint village

2. odd, peculiar, or inappropriate

   a quaint sense of duty

Other Word Forms

• quaintly adverb
• quaintness noun

Word History and Origins

Origin of quaint¹

First recorded in 1175–1225; Middle English queinte, from Old French, variant of cointe “clever, pleasing,” from Latin cognitus “learned, known,” past participle of cognōscere “to learn, become acquainted”; cognition

Word History and Origins

Origin of quaint¹

C13 (in the sense: clever): from Old French cointe, from Latin cognitus known, from cognoscere to ascertain

Example Sentences

They did not look quaint or musty but decidedly contemporary, even stylish.

Read more on The Wall Street Journal

The present trend—longer lives and lower birthrates—will make Ford’s labor-force problem seem quaint as we move through the next two to three decades.

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He had searched every one of those sickeningly quaint villages, with their happy yodelers and endless mugs of hot chocolate, but to no avail.

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Though Marion looked quaint and idyllic from the outside, the city’s Colored residents knew to stay in their place.

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And that’s pretty much how I imagined it; what I never imagined is that the future reader might look back on any of this, or on my own peculiar experience, and say, “How quaint.”

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Related Words

• bizarre 
• curious 
• fanciful 
• funny 
• laughable 
• peculiar 
• unusual 
• weird 
• whimsical