Contextualizebeta

endearment

noun

Etymology

From endear + -ment.

  1. inherited from *diurijaz✻ — “dear, precious, expensive”
  2. inherited from *diurī✻
  3. inherited from dīere — “of great value or excellence, expensive, beloved”
  4. inherited from dere
  5. prefixed as endear — “en + dear”
  6. suffixed as endearment — “endear + ment”

Definitions

  1. The act or process of endearing, of causing (something or someone) to be loved or to be…

    The act or process of endearing, of causing (something or someone) to be loved or to be the object of affection.

    • Every step of that walk led Jeff deeper into an excursion of endearment. It was amazingly true that he trod beside her an acknowledged friend, a secret lover.

  2. The state or characteristic of being endeared.

    • He could not forget the fond and earnest look that had passed between her and some other man—the attitude of familiar confidence, if not of positive endearment.

  3. An expression of affection.

    • When they were alone he called him "my boy," an endearment he never gave another.

The neighborhood

Vish — recursive loop

A definitional loop anchored at endearment. Each word in the ring is defined by the next; follow the chain far enough and it folds back on itself. Scroll to it and watch.

01endearment02endeared03beloved04loved05love06darling07sweetheart

A definitional loop anchored at endearment. Each word in the ring appears in the definition of the next; follow the chain far enough and it folds back on itself.

7 hops · closes at endearment

curated · pre-corpus. live cycle detection across the full graph is the next major milestone.

sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA