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plaint. In DICTIOUS you will not only get to know all the dictionary meanings for the word
plaint, but we will also tell you about its etymology, its characteristics and you will know how to say
plaint in singular and plural. Everything you need to know about the word
plaint you have here. The definition of the word
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English
Etymology
From Middle English plainte, borrowed from Anglo-Norman plainte (“lamentation”), plaint (“lament”), and Old French pleinte (“lamentation”), pleint (“lament”) (modern French plainte), from Medieval Latin plancta (“plaint”), from Latin planctus (“a beating of the breast in lamentation, beating, lamentation”), from Latin plango (“I beat the breast, I lament”); see plain.
Pronunciation
Noun
plaint (plural plaints)
- A complaint.
1897, Henry James, What Maisie Knew:she seemed to repeat, though with perceptible resignation, her plaint of a moment before. ‘Your father, darling, is a very odd person indeed.’
- (poetic or archaic) A lament or woeful cry.
1827, Maria Elizabeth Budden, Nina, An Icelandic Tale, page 11:In the first paroxysm of his grief, Ingolfr exclaimed, (what sorrowing heart has not echoed his plaint?) that he could never more taste of joy.
1938, Xavier Herbert, chapter V, in Capricornia, page 75:His shriek was as feeble as the plaint of a grass-stalk in a storm.
- (archaic) A sad song.
- (archaic or UK law) An accusation.
Once the plaint had been made there was nothing that could be done to revoke it.
Further reading
- “plaint”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
- “plaint”, in The Century Dictionary , New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.
Anagrams
French
Etymology
From Middle French plaint, pleint, from Old French plaint, pleint, from Latin planctus.
Participle
plaint (feminine plainte, masculine plural plaints, feminine plural plaintes)
- past participle of plaindre
Anagrams