polite

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See also: Polite, polité, and politè

English

Etymology

From Latin polītus (“polished”), past participle of poliō (“I polish, smooth”); see polish.

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /pəˈlaɪt/
  • audio(file)
  • Rhymes: -aɪt

Adjective

polite (comparative politer or more polite, superlative politest or most polite)

  1. Well-mannered, civilized.
    It's not polite to use a mobile phone in a restaurant.
    • 1733, Alexander Pope, Epistle to Bathurst:
      He marries, bows at court, and grows polite.
    • 1913, Joseph C[rosby] Lincoln, chapter IV, in Mr. Pratt’s Patients, New York, N.Y., London: D[aniel] Appleton and Company, →OCLC:
      I told him about everything I could think of; and what I couldn't think of he did. He asked about six questions during my yarn, but every question had a point to it. At the end he bowed and thanked me once more. As a thanker he was main-truck high; I never see anybody so polite.
  2. (obsolete) Smooth, polished, burnished.

Synonyms

Antonyms

Derived terms

Related terms

Translations

Verb

polite (third-person singular simple present polites, present participle politing, simple past and past participle polited)

  1. (obsolete, transitive) To polish; to refine; to render polite.
    • 1691, John Ray, The Wisdom of God Manifested in the Works of the Creation. , London: Samuel Smith, , →OCLC:
      those exercises plied, which polite men's spirits

References

Further reading

Anagrams

Italian

Adjective

polite f pl

  1. feminine plural of polito

Anagrams

Latin

Verb

polīte

  1. second-person plural present active imperative of poliō

References

  • “polite”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  • “polite”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers

Spanish

Verb

polite

  1. second-person singular voseo imperative of polir combined with te
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