gaunt

See also: Gaunt

English

Alternative forms

gant (dialectal, Scotland)
gent (Scotland)

Etymology

From Middle English gawnt, gawnte (“lean, slender”), from Old French jaunet, probably from a Scandinavian/North Germanic source, related to Old Norse gandr (“magic staff, stick”), from Proto-Germanic *gandaz (“stick, staff”), from Proto-Indo-European *gʷʰen- (“to beat, hit, drive”).

Cognates:

Cognate with Icelandic gandur (“magic staff”), Norwegian gand (“tall pointed stick; tall, thin man”), Danish gand, gan, Norwegian gana (“cut-off tree limbs”), Bavarian Gunten (“a kind of wedge or peg”). Related also to Old English gūþ (“battle”), Latin dēfendō (“ward off, defend”). Compare also dialectal Swedish gank (“a lean, emaciated horse”).

Pronunciation

enPR: gônt, IPA^(key): /ɡɔːnt/
(some accents) enPR: gänt, IPA^(key): /ɡɑːnt/
Audio (US) (file)
Rhymes: -ɔːnt, -ɑːnt

Adjective

gaunt (comparative gaunter, superlative gauntest)

Lean, angular, and bony.
- 1866, Herman Melville, Battle-Pieces and Aspects of the War‎, The Portent:
  Hanging from the beam,
  Slowly swaying (such the law),
  Gaunt the shadow on your green,
  Shenandoah!
- 1894, Joseph Jacobs, chapter 1, in The Fables of Aesop‎, archived from the original on 28 February 2011:
  A gaunt Wolf was almost dead with hunger when he happened to meet a House-dog who was passing by.
Haggard, drawn, and emaciated.
- 1895–1897, H[erbert] G[eorge] Wells, “The Stillness”, in The War of the Worlds, London: William Heinemann, published 1898, →OCLC, book II (The Earth under the Martians), page 239:
  Far away I saw a gaunt cat slink crouchingly along a wall, but traces of men there were none.
- 1913 November 22, Arthur Conan Doyle, “The Adventure of the Dying Detective”, in His Last Bow: A Reminiscence of Sherlock Holmes, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: George H[enry] Doran Company, published October 1917, →OCLC, page 181:
  In the dim light of a foggy November day the sick-room was a gloomy spot, but it was that gaunt, wasted face staring at me from the bed which sent a chill to my heart.
- 2024 February 17, “The extraordinary courage of Alexei Navalny”, in FT Weekend, The FT View, page 8:
  Whatever the official cause of his is death is said to be—and Navalny, though gaunt, seemed in good spirits in a court hearing a day earlier—foreign leaders are rightly holding the Kremlin responsible.
Bleak, barren, and desolate.
- 1896, Mary Baker Eddy, “The Way”, in Miscellaneous Writings 1883–1896‎, page 355:
  The present stage of progress in Christian Science presents two opposite aspects, — a full-orbed promise, and a gaunt want.
- 1908, William Hope Hodgson, chapter 14, in The House on the Borderland‎, archived from the original on 14 April 2012:
  Behind me, rose up, to an extraordinary height, gaunt, black cliffs.