What is another word for courtly?

Pronunciation: [kˈɔːtli] (IPA)

The word courtly typically describes something relating to courts, especially those of European monarchies. It implies elegance, refinement, manners, and etiquette associated with the aristocracy. Some synonyms for courtly are chivalrous, courteous, gallant, refined, sophisticated, genteel, and polished. These words capture the sense of grace and poise that is often associated with the high society and nobility of past eras. Other synonyms include cultivated, well-bred, cultured, urbane, gracious, and polished. Overall, these words describe the demeanor, appearance, behavior, or language of someone who embodies the ideals of courtly culture.

Synonyms for Courtly:

What are the hypernyms for Courtly?

A hypernym is a word with a broad meaning that encompasses more specific words called hyponyms.

What are the opposite words for courtly?

The word courtly describes elegance, refinement, and graceful behavior that we usually associate with the court of a king or queen. The antonyms of courtly are uncivil, boorish, and crude. These words reflect the opposite of refined behavior or manners. Someone who is boorish lacks manners, culture, and sophistication. Crude behavior is considered unpleasant, offensive, and vulgar. Uncivil behavior is rude, discourteous, and lacking in manners. These antonyms showcase the opposite of being polite or dignified, which is the essence of courtly. Therefore, if you want to describe someone who is the opposite of courtly, you can use these words as antonyms.

Usage examples for Courtly

You think that the courtly grace, the sweet refinement, the elegant manners, the words that speak of due knowledge of life and men and women, represent a state of fetterdom; but you must also have felt their charm.
"Girls of the Forest"
L. T. Meade
Jack sat down, not gratefully, but quite courtly.
"Only One Love, or Who Was the Heir"
Charles Garvice
The most skilful musicians which Paris could furnish had been procured, and the ears of the guests were delighted by choice music, both vocal and instrumental, while the courtly host employed all the grace and charm which he had ever at command to fascinate the three royal ladies, and particularly the young Queen of England, who was inclined to look upon him with favour as in some sort the author of her marriage.
"Henrietta Maria"
Henrietta Haynes

Famous quotes with Courtly

  • [Su Wu] relates how he shed tears during this separation, and urges his wife to remember their first love. He vows to return to her if he survives his ordeal, but if he dies first, then he hopes she will remember him with love. The courtly tone of his message to his wife, and his expression of integrity are mirrored in Su Wu's political life. In captivity he was offered the chance of liberty if he renounced his country, but he refused to become a traitor, for which he was honoured on his return.
    Su Wu
  • A little apish hat, couched fast to the pate, like an oyster; French cambric ruffs, deep with a witness, starched to the purpose: Delicate in speech; quaint in array; conceited in all points; In courtly guiles, a passing singular odd man.
    Edward de Vere
  • Homer's poems were writ from a free fury, an absolute and full soul; Virgil's out of a courtly, laborious, and altogether imitatory spirit: not a simile he hath but is Homer's; not an invention, person, or disposition but is wholly or originally built upon Homerical foundations, and in many places hath the very words Homer useth; ... all Homer's books are such as have been precedents ever since of all sorts of poems; imitating none, nor ever worthily imitated of any.
    Homer
  • The courtly person (cortegiano, gentilhomme, gentleman, Hofmann) has gone through a training in self-esteem that expresses itself in many ways: in aristocratically pretentious opinions, in polished or majestic manners, in gallant or heroic patterns of feeling as well as in a selective, aesthetic sensitivity for that which is said to be courtly or pretty. The noble, far removed from any self-doubt, should achieve all this with a complete matter-of-factness. Any uncertainty, any doubt in these things signifies a slackening in the nobility’s cultural “identity.” This class narcissism, which has petrified into a form of life, tolerates no irony, no exception, no slips, because such disturbances would give rise to unwelcome reflections. The French nobles did not turn up their noses at Shakespeare’s “barbarism” without reason. In his plays one already “smells” the human ordinariness of those who want to stand before society as the best. With the ascendancy of the bourgeoisie, the place of the “best” is awarded anew. The bourgeois ego, in an unprecedented, creative storming to the heights of a new class consciousness won for itself an autonomous narcissism.
    Peter Sloterdijk
  • Conquest brings no lasting happiness unless the person conquered was possessed of free will. Only then can there be doubt and anxiety and those continual victories over habit and boredom which produce the keenest pleasures of all. The comely inmates of the harem are rarely loved, for they are prisoners. Inversely, the far too accessible ladies of present-day seaside resorts almost never inspire love, because they are emancipated. Where is love's victory when there is neither veil, modesty, nor self-respect to check its progress? Excessive freedom raises up the transparent walls of an invisible seraglio to surround these easily acquired ladies. Romantic love requires women, not that they should be inaccessible, but that their lives should be lived within the rather narrow limits of religion and convention. These conditions, admirably observed in the Middle-Ages, produced the courtly love of that time. The honoured mistress of the chateau remained within its walls while the knight set out for the Crusades and thought about his lady. In those days a man scarcely ever tried to arouse love in the object of his passion. He resigned himself to loving in silence, or at least without hope. Such frustrated passions are considered by some to be naive and unreal, but to certain sensitive souls this kind of remote admiration is extremely pleasurable, because, being quite subjective, it is better protected against deception and disillusion.
    André Maurois

Word of the Day

multitasker
The word "multitasker" usually refers to someone who can perform different tasks simultaneously. However, there are several antonyms for this word, which describe the opposite type...