decorum

English

Etymology

Learned borrowing from Latin decōrum, neuter form of decōrus (“proper, decent”).

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /dɪˈkɔːɹəm/

• Audio (Southern England)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɔːɹəm
• Hyphenation: de‧co‧rum

Noun

decorum (countable and uncountable, plural decora or decorums)

1. (uncountable) Appropriate social behavior.

   Synonyms: decency, courtesy, propriety, etiquette

   • 2010, Pseudonymous Bosch (pseudonym; Raphael Simon), This Isn't What It Looks Like, ch. 4

     It was sort of a finishing school. You know, to teach proper social decorum and so on and so forth.

   • 2020 September 29, Jonathan Martin, Alexander Burns, “With Cross Talk, Lies and Mockery, Trump Tramples Decorum in Debate With Biden”, in New York Times‎:

     Mr. Trump’s volcanic performance appeared to be the gambit of a president seeking to tarnish his opponent by any means available, unbounded by norms of accuracy and decorum and unguided by a calculated sense of how to sway the electorate or assuage voters’ reservations about his leadership.

   • 2023 May 25, Martin Pengelly, “House Democrats laugh off Marjorie Taylor Greene’s call for ‘decorum’”, in The Guardian‎:

     Democrats in the House chamber burst into raucous laughter when Marjorie Taylor Greene called for “decorum”.

2. (countable) A convention of social behavior.
   • 1834 January, [Edgar Allan Poe], “The Visionary”, in The Lady’s Book, page 41, column 2:

     In the architecture and embellishments of the chamber, the evident design was to dazzle and astound. Little attention had been paid to the decora of what is technically called “keeping,” or to the proprieties of nationality. The eye wandered from object to object, and rested upon none; neither the “Grotesques” of the Greek painters, nor the sculptures of the best Italian days, nor the huge carvings of untutored Egypt.

Related terms

Translations

Anagrams

• Cudmore

Latin

Pronunciation

• (Classical) IPA^(key): /deˈkoː.rum/,
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /deˈko.rum/,

Etymology 1

Noun use of the neuter form of decōrus (“becoming, fitting, proper”).

Noun

decōrum n (genitive decōrī); second declension

1. seemliness, propriety

Declension

Second-declension noun (neuter).

Descendants

References

• “decorum”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• decorum in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.

Etymology 2

See the etymology of the corresponding lemma form.

Adjective

decōrum

1. inflection of decōrus:
   1. nominative/accusative/vocative neuter singular
   2. accusative masculine singular

Noun

decōrum

1. genitive plural of decor

Polish

Polish Wikipedia has an article on:

decorum

Wikipedia ^pl

Alternative forms

• dekorum

Etymology

Unadapted borrowing from Latin decōrum. Doublet of dekoracja and dekorować.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /dɛˈkɔ.rum/
• Rhymes: -ɔrum
• Syllabification: de‧co‧rum

Noun

decorum n

1. (literature) decorum (principle of classical rhetoric, poetry, and theatrical theory concerning the fitness or otherwise of a style to a theatrical subject)
2. (anthropology) decorum (appropriate social behavior; propriety)

Declension

Further reading

• decorum in Polish dictionaries at PWN