swain
[sweyn]
noun
a male admirer or lover.
a country lad.
a country gallant.
RELATED WORDS
sweetheart, squire, love, suitor, paramour, admirer, steady, honey, escort, flame, beloved, lover, cavalier, inamorato, wooer
Nearby words
- swaggering,
- swaggeringly,
- swaggie,
- swagman,
- swahili,
- swainson's hawk,
- swainson's thrush,
- swak,
- swakara,
- swale
Origin of swain
before 1150; Middle English swein servant < Old Norse sveinn boy, servant; cognate with Old English swān
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2019
Examples from the Web for swain
swain
noun archaic, or poetic
Word Origin for swain
Old English swān swineherd; related to Old High German swein, Old Norse sveinn boy; see swine
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition
© William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
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swain
mid-12c., "young man attendant upon a knight," from Old Norse sveinn "boy, servant, attendant," from Proto-Germanic *swainaz "attendant, servant," properly "one's own (man)," from PIE *swoi-no-, from root *swe- "oneself, alone, apart" (see idiom). Cognate with Old English swan "shepherd, swineherd," Old Saxon swen, Old High German swein. Meaning "country or farm laborer" is from 1570s; that of "lover, wooer" (in pastoral poetry) is from 1580s.
Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper