verb
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to behave flirtatiously
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to dally or trifle
Etymology
Origin of coquet
1685–95; < French; literally, cockerel, equivalent to coq cock + -et -et
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
A: I'm afraid I was a bit of a coquet in my youth, but now that I'm a grandmother with an 18-year-old granddaughter, I'm simplifying what I wear.
From Seattle Times ● Sep. 1, 2010
But the triumph is Lady Froth, ‘a great coquet, pretender to poetry, wit, and learning,’ and one would almost as lief have seen Mrs. Mountfort in the part as the Bracegirdle’s Millamant.
From The Comedies of William Congreve Volume 1 [of 2] by G. S. (George Slythe) Street
The wife at last made her appearance, at once a slattern and a coquet; much emaciated, but still carrying the remains of beauty.
From A Century of English Essays An Anthology Ranging from Caxton to R. L. Stevenson & the Writers of Our Own Time by Ernest Rhys
Her proud obstinacy was not capable of that; she was not one of those sympathetic, dependent women who like to make little blunders so as to be able to coquet with their charming penitence.
From Felix Lanzberg's Expiation by Ossip Schubin
It is a place of fugitive resort, an heterogeneous assemblage of sea-mews and stockbrokers, Amphitrites of the town, and misses that coquet with the Ocean.
From Hastings and Neighbourhood by Walter Higgins
Madame coquetted with him in the most captivating and naive manner, with eyes, gestures, and a profusion of compliments, till the Colonel’s old head felt thirty years younger on his padded shoulders.
From "The Awakening" by Kate Chopin
If Eloise d'Anville hadn't coquetted with young Creil I shouldn't be Commissioner here to-day, settling my account with Louis.
From One-Act Plays By Modern Authors by Various
The idle wits frequented the public walks, coquetted, and made madrigals.
From Priests, Women, and Families by Jules Michelet
Much of what my grandfather had told me of the first Pretender was repeated, save that as the first had made alliance with the Mohammedans, so the second coquetted with the Christians.
From Dreamers of the Ghetto by Israel Zangwill
So she coquetted even with suffering and found pleasure in bearing it gracefully.
From On the Cross A Romance of the Passion Play at Oberammergau by Wilhelmine von Hillern
A man coquetting with too many countries is as bad as a bigamist, and loses his soul altogether.
From The Letters of William James, Vol. II by William James
The conjurer twists first one, then two, butterflies out of a bit of white paper, and, by means of a fan, causes them to fly and poise as if they were coquetting with July breezes.
From From the Oak to the Olive A Plain record of a Pleasant Journey by Julia Ward Howe
Remember, no vagaries, no irregularities, no coquetting with the ‘one time that never hurts one.’
From The Little Vanities of Mrs. Whittaker A Novel by John Strange Winter
With Heine, too, who at that time was coquetting with Communism, he carried on a sprightly and not unfruitful intercourse.
From The life and teaching of Karl Marx by M. Beer
But they finally went away, and later in the season the wrens appeared, and after a little coquetting, were regularly installed in their old quarters and were as happy as only wrens can be.
From Wake-Robin by John Burroughs
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