svelte

English

Etymology

From French svelte, from Italian svelto (“stretched out”), past participle of svellere (“to pluck out, root out”), from Vulgar Latin *exvellere, from ex + vellere (“to pluck, stretch”).

Pronunciation

• Rhymes: -ɛlt
• IPA^(key): /ˈsvɛlt/, /ˈsfɛlt/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Audio (AU)

  (file)

Adjective

svelte (comparative svelter, superlative sveltest)

1. Attractively thin; gracefully slender.
   • 1990, Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick, Epistemology of the Closet, published 2008, page 24:

     Psychoanalytic theory […] seemed to promise to introduce a certain becoming amplitude into discussions of what different people are like — only to turn, in its streamlined trajectory across so many institutional boundaries, into the sveltest of metatheoretical disciplines, sleeked down to such elegant operational entities as the mother, the father, the preoedipal, the oedipal, the other or Other.

   • 2007 January 19, Charles Isherwood, “Welterweight Bialystock Treads Softly on Big Shtick”, in New York Times‎:

     Clearly the producers of “The Producers” were so little inclined to tinker with a winning formula that they chose not to excise a few lines of dialogue to accommodate the svelter physique of their new leading man, preposterous though it is that anyone in a fit of pique would deride a fellow as “once-husky.”

   • 2009, Kim Bloomer, Animals Taught Me That, page 73:

     My first priority was to help Trumps lose her pudgy look and gain a healthier, svelter size.

   • 2010, M. S. Simpson, Kabuki in a G-String, page 158:

     If her dream of being naked in front of Simon were to come true – and she knew, somehow, that it would – she needed to be the sveltest version of herself that had ever existed. Fries wouldn't help peel away those pounds.

2. Refined, delicate.
   • 1942, Beryl Markham, West with the Night:

     Peering down from the cockpit at grazing elephant, you have the feeling that what you are beholding is wonderful, but not authentic. It is not only incongruous in the sense that animals simply are not as big as trees, but also in the sense that the twentieth century, tidy and svelte with stainless steel as it is, would not possibly permit such prehistoric monsters to wander in its garden.

   • 2023 August 5, Simon Hattenstone, “Labour MP Chris Bryant on cleaning up parliament, and why he’s not afraid to pick a fight: ‘I’ve got in more scrapes than most people’”, in The Guardian‎:

     At 61, Bryant looks good – smart and svelte in an electric blue suit, youthful, a full head of hair except for a white scar at the back that looks like a side door into his brain.

Usage notes

Used mainly as a compliment, whereas words like thin, scrawny and skinny could be used in negative connotations.

Synonyms

• (attractively thin): lithe, slim, willowy; see also Thesaurus:slender
• (refined): elegant, gentle

Translations

Anagrams

• levets

French

Etymology

Borrowed from Italian svelto.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /svɛlt/, /zvɛlt/

• Audio

  (file)

Adjective

svelte (plural sveltes)

1. thin; slender

   Synonyms: dégagé, élancé, mince

   Antonyms: gros, large

Further reading

• “svelte”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé , 2012.

Italian

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈzvɛl.te/, /ˈzvel.te/
• Rhymes: -ɛlte, -elte
• Hyphenation: svèl‧te, svél‧te

Adjective

svelte f pl

1. feminine plural of svelto

Participle

svelte f pl

1. feminine plural of svelto

References

Norwegian Nynorsk

Etymology 1

From Old Norse svelta, from Proto-Germanic *sweltaną. The noun is derived from the verb.

Verb

svelte (present tense svelt, past tense svalt, supine svolte, past participle svolten, present participle sveltande, imperative svelt)

1. (intransitive) to feel hungry
2. (intransitive) to starve

Alternative forms

• svelta (a-infinitive)

Derived terms

• sveltihel
• svolten

Noun

svelte f (definite singular svelta, uncountable)

1. hunger, starvation
2. (card games) a two player card game wherein the goal is to "starve" the opponent of all their card

Etymology 2

Causative of svelte (Etymology 1). From Old Norse svelta, from Proto-Germanic *swaltijaną.

Verb

svelte (present tense svelter, past tense svelte, past participle svelt, passive infinitive sveltast, present participle sveltande, imperative svelt)

1. (transitive) to starve (someone)

Alternative forms

• svelta (a-infinitive)

Derived terms

• svelte ut

References

• “svelte” in The Nynorsk Dictionary.