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pretty

Pronunciation: /ˈpɹɪt.i/

The English word “pretty” has 14 meanings listed here.

adjective

  1. Pleasant to the sight or other senses; attractive, especially of women or children.
  2. Of objects or things: nice-looking, appealing.
  3. Fine-looking; only superficially attractive; initially appealing but having little substance; see petty.
  4. Effeminate.
  5. Cunning; clever, skilful.
  6. Moderately large; considerable.
  7. Excellent, commendable, pleasing; fitting or proper (of actions, thoughts etc.).
  8. Awkward, unpleasant, bad.
  9. Matching commonly accepted principles of formatting and syntax, for the sake of readability.

adverb

  1. Somewhat, fairly, quite; sometimes also (by meiosis) very.
  2. Prettily, in a pretty manner.

noun

  1. A pretty person; a term of address to a pretty person.
  2. Something that is pretty.

verb

  1. To make pretty; to beautify

Etymology

From Middle English prety, preti, praty, prati, from Old English prættiġ (“tricky, crafty, sly, cunning, wily, astute”), from Proto-West Germanic *prattug, from Proto-Germanic *prattugaz (“boastful, sly, slick, deceitful, tricky, cunning”), corresponding to prat (“trick”) + -y. Doublet of pratty. Cognate with Dutch prettig (“nice, pleasant”), Low German prettig (“funny”), Icelandic prettugur…

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Definitions are from Wiktionary, extracted by Kaikki.org, and are available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.