Quasimodo

¹ American  

[kwah-suh-moh-doh, -zuh-moh-, kwah-zee-maw-daw] / ˌkwɑ səˈmoʊ doʊ, -zəˈmoʊ-, ˌkwɑ ziˈmɔ dɔ /

noun

1. Salvatore 1901–68, Italian poet: Nobel Prize 1959.

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Quasimodo ² American  

[kwah-suh-moh-doh, -zuh-moh-] / ˌkwɑ səˈmoʊ doʊ, -zəˈmoʊ- /

noun

1. Low Sunday.

2. the ugly, humpbacked protagonist of The Hunchback of Notre Dame, by Victor Hugo.

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Quasimodo British  

/ ˌkwɔːzɪˈməʊdəʊ /

noun

1. another name for Low Sunday

2. a character in Victor Hugo's novel Notre-Dame de Paris (1831), a grotesque hunch-backed bellringer of the cathedral of Notre Dame

3. Salvatore (salvaˈtoːre). 1901–68, Italian poet, whose early work expresses symbolist ideas and techniques. His later work is more concerned with political and social issues: Nobel prize for literature 1959

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Etymology

Origin of Quasimodo

First recorded in 1840–50 Quasimodo ¹ for def. 1; from Late Latin, from the opening words of the introit antiphon for the Sunday: Quasi modo genitī infantēs … “As just born children …” (1 Pet. 2:2); 1830–35 Quasimodo ¹ for def. 2

Example Sentences

Chileans mark the Quasimodo Feast, a celebration held on the first Sunday after Easter when horseback riders known as “Huasos” accompany priests in the rural commune of Colina to give communion to the sick, in a procession that pays tribute to the Virgin of Carmen.

From Seattle Times

“I tell people I’m the second-most famous bell ringer after Quasimodo,” he said in a 2016 interview with Vulture, New York magazine’s culture site.

From New York Times

The musical, which is sung in French with English supertitles, follows the beautiful Esmeralda and the three men who vie to win her love: the kind hunchback Quasimodo; the twisted archdeacon Frollo; and the egotistic soldier Phoebus.

From New York Times

You’ve heard of Quasimodo, the hunchback of Notre Dame, the actor Brian Cox announces at the start of “Quasi,” but you haven’t heard this version.

From New York Times

He had been thinking of the scene in the 1956 film adaptation in which Anthony Quinn, as the hunchback, Quasimodo, begs Gina Lollobrigida’s Esmeralda, the object of all the men’s attentions, for water.

From New York Times