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English
Etymology
Borrowed from Scots glamour (“magic”), alteration of Middle English gramere (“grammar”), from Old French gramaire. Doublet of glamoury, gramarye, grammar, and grimoire.
Pronunciation
Noun
glamour (countable and uncountable, plural glamours)
- (uncountable) Originally, enchantment; magic charm; especially, the effect of a spell that causes one to see objects in a form that differs from reality, typically to make filthy, ugly, or repulsive things seem beauteous.
1882, James Thomson (B. V.), The City of Dreadful Night:They often murmur to themselves, they speak
To one another seldom, for their woe
Broods maddening inwardly and scorns to wreak
Itself abroad; and if at whiles it grow
To frenzy which must rave, none heeds the clamour,
Unless there waits some victim of like glamour,
To rave in turn, who lends attentive show.
- (uncountable) Alluring beauty or charm (often with sex appeal).
- glamour magazines; a glamour model
- (uncountable) Any excitement, appeal, or attractiveness associated with a person, place, or thing; that which makes something appealing.
- The idea of being a movie star has lost its glamour for me.
1899 February, Joseph Conrad, “The Heart of Darkness”, in Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine, volume CLXV, number M, New York, N.Y.: The Leonard Scott Publishing Company, , →OCLC, part I, page 197:“The North Pole was one of these places, I remember. Well, I haven’t been there yet, and shall not try now. The glamour’s off.”
1950 May 7, The Daily Telegraph, Sydney, page 13, column 3:Boys have not lost their love for adventure, and still have `itchy feet.' Many are seeking glamor jobs, want to be writers, detectives, seamen.
- Any artificial interest in, or association with, objects, or persons, through which they appear delusively magnified or glorified.
- A kind of haze in the air, causing things to appear different from what they really are.
1861 October, “The Nelumbium Luteum, or Yellow Egyptian Lotus.”, in Thomas Meehan, editor, The Gardner’s Monthly and Advertiser Horticultural, volume III, number 10, 23 North Sixth Street, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States, page 311:When the golden October comes, with its witching of hazy air that makes a glamour for all things and any landscape, we shall see these offspring of poetic myth stretch out beside the creeks, breaking the tender hulls for their magical chincapins, and feeding on them and on the dreams of which they are the talismans.
- (countable) An item, motif, person, image that by association improves appearance.
Alternative forms
- glamor (US); however, the -our spelling is the more common spelling, even in the US
Derived terms
Descendants
Translations
Verb
glamour (third-person singular simple present glamours, present participle glamouring, simple past and past participle glamoured)
- (transitive) To enchant; to bewitch.
References
- ^ Postrel, Virginia (2013 November 5) “One: The Magic of Glamour”, in The Power of Glamour: Longing and the Art of Visual Persuasion, Simon & Schuster, →ISBN: “Reflecting this sense of the word, by 1902 Webster's included two new definitions: “a kind of haze in the air, causing things to appear different from what they really are”…”
Danish
Etymology
From English glamour.
Pronunciation
Noun
glamour c (singular definite glamouren, not used in plural form)
- glamour
Derived terms
Finnish
Etymology
From French glamour.
Pronunciation
Noun
glamour
- glamour (charm)
Declension
Further reading
French
Etymology
(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)
Pronunciation
Noun
glamour m (uncountable)
- glamour
Adjective
glamour (invariable)
- glamorous
Norwegian Bokmål
Etymology
From English glamour.
Noun
glamour m (definite singular glamouren)
- glamour
Related terms
References
Norwegian Nynorsk
Etymology
From English glamour.
Noun
glamour m (definite singular glamouren)
- glamour
Related terms
References
Portuguese
Etymology
Unadapted borrowing from English glamour.
Pronunciation
Noun
glamour m (uncountable)
- glamour
- Synonyms: charme, encanto
Spanish
Etymology
Unadapted borrowing from English glamour.
Pronunciation
Noun
glamour m (uncountable)
- Alternative spelling of glamur
Usage notes
According to Royal Spanish Academy (RAE) prescriptions, unadapted foreign words should be written in italics in a text printed in roman type, and vice versa, and in quotation marks in a manuscript text or when italics are not available. In practice, this RAE prescription is not always followed.
Further reading
Swedish
Noun
glamour c (definite singular glamouren) (uncountable)
- glamour