embonpoint

English

WOTD – 10 June 2011

Etymology

Borrowed from French embonpoint.

Pronunciation

• enPR: äɴbôɴpwĕɴ, IPA^(key): /ɑ̃bɔ̃pwɛ̃/

  • Audio (UK):

    (file)

Noun

embonpoint (countable and uncountable, plural embonpoints)

1. Plumpness, stoutness, especially when voluptuous.
   • 1911, J.M. Barrie, Peter and Wendy:

     She was slightly inclined to embonpoint.

   • 1922 February, James Joyce, Ulysses, Paris: Shakespeare and Company, […], →OCLC:

     The beautiful woman threw off her sabletrimmed wrap, displaying her queenly shoulders and heaving embonpoint.

   • 2002, Colin Jones, The Great Nation, Penguin 2003, p. 1:

     The patient's physicians had always allowed him to indulge a gargantuan appetite, countering his intake and regulating his embonpoint by a heroic diet of purges and enemas.

Translations

plumpness

• Finnish: muodokkuus
• French: embonpoint (fr) m
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}
• Russian: полнота́ (ru) f (polnotá), дородность (ru) f (dorodnostʹ)
• Serbo-Croatian: punašnost (sh)

Adjective

embonpoint (comparative more embonpoint, superlative most embonpoint)

1. Plump, chubby, buxom.
   • 1834, Letitia Elizabeth Landon, Francesca Carrara, volume 1, page 294:

     "Though it is six years since I have seen you," exclaimed Anne, "you are not the least altered; instead of that, you are handsomer than ever; your being rather more embonpoint suits you, and your complexion is brilliant to a degree."

   Synonyms: see Thesaurus:overweight, Thesaurus:voluptuous

Translations

plump, chubby, buxom

• Finnish: muodokas (fi)
• Japanese: ぽっちゃり (pocchari)
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}
• Russian: по́лный (ru) (pólnyj), дородный (ru) (dorodnyj)
• Serbo-Croatian: pun (sh), punašan (sh)
• Spanish: rechoncho (es), rollizo (es)

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French

Etymology

Univerbation of en bon point.

The rule in French is to write /n/ as /m/ in front of /m, p/ or /b/ - here the rule is applied to the first /n/ but not the second since the rule does not apply to the words derived from bon : bonbon, bonbonne and bonbonnière.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ɑ̃.bɔ̃.pwɛ̃/

• Audio:

  (file)

Noun

embonpoint m (plural embonpoints)

1. plumpness, stoutness

   Synonyms: obésité, surpoids

   • 1844, Honoré de Balzac, Modeste Mignon:

     Quoique La Brière fût alors mince, il appartient à ce genre de tempéraments qui, formés tard, prennent à trente ans un embonpoint inattendu.

     (please add an English translation of this quotation)

   • 1924, Emmanuel Bove, Mes Amis‎^[1]:

     La patronne s’appelle Lucie Dunois. Son nom, en majuscules d’émail, est cimenté au vitrage de la devanture. Il manque trois lettres. Lucie a l’embonpoint d’un buveur de bière.

     (please add an English translation of this quotation)

Further reading

• “embonpoint”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.