# piquant
## English
### Alternative forms

* piquante

### Etymology

Borrowed from Middle French piquant (“pricking, stimulating, irritating”), present participle of piquer, possibly from Old French pikier (“to prick, sting, nettle”). Doublet of picong. Related to pike.

### Pronunciation

* Audio (US):(file)
* IPA: /ˈpiːkənt/, /ˈpiːˌkɑːnt/, /piːˈkɑːnt/, /ˈpiːkwənt/
* Rhymes: -iːkənt, -ɑːnt
* Hyphenation: pi‧quant

### Adjective

piquant (comparative more piquant, superlative most piquant)
* (archaic) Causing hurt feelings; scathing, severe. [from 16th c.]
* Stimulating to the senses; engaging; charming. [from 17th c.]
** 1791 (date written), Mary Wollstonecraft, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman: With Strictures on Political and Moral Subjects, London: […] J[oseph] Johnson, […], published 1792, →OCLC:Their husbands […] leave home to seek for more agreeable, may I be allowed to use a significant French word, piquant society […]
** 1848 November – 1850 December, William Makepeace Thackeray, chapter 55, in The History of Pendennis. […], volume (please specify |volume=I or II), London: Bradbury and Evans, […], published 1849–1850, →OCLC:He looked after her as she retreated, with a fondness which was rendered more piquant, as it were, by the mixture of a certain scorn which accompanied it.
* Favorably stimulating to the palate; pleasantly spicy; tangy. [from 17th c.]
** 2000, Lynn Bedford Hall, The Best of Cooking in South Africa, 2nd edition, Cape Town: Struik Publishers, →ISBN, page 103:Pork Chops with Apple and Port These chops are baked in a piquant sauce containing fruit, honey, cinnamon, lemon and port, all of which reduces to a spicy syrup.
** 2005, Clifford A. Wright, Some Like it Hot: Spicy Favorites from the World's Hot Zones, Boston, Mass.: Harvard Common Press, →ISBN, page 170:Elsewhere in South America, excepting Bahia in Brazil, one does not encounter piquant cuisine, although one may stumble on a piquant dish now and then […]
** 2009, Sara Engram with Katie Luber and Kimberly Toqe, The Spice Kitchen: Everyday Cooking with Organic Spices, Kansas City, Mo.: Andrews McMeel Publishing, →ISBN, page 9:French charcuterie relies on cloves in the quatre épices, or four-spice powder, for seasoning fine sausages and piquant marinades.
* Producing a burning sensation due to the presence of chilies or similar spices; spicy, hot.

#### Derived terms

* piquancy

#### Translations
## French
### Etymology

Present participle of piquer.

### Pronunciation

* IPA: /pi.kɑ̃/
* Audio:(file)

### Adjective

piquant (feminine piquante, masculine plural piquants, feminine plural piquantes)
* spiky, spiny
* piquant, pungent, spicy-hot (of food)
    Synonym: épicé
* cold; ice-cold
    Synonyms: glacé, froid
    froid piquant ― freezing cold
    vent piquant ― ice-cold wind
* scathing (of humor, a joke, etc.)
* (usually of a person) attractive
** 1965, Paul Dey, Orages sur le Tage, Paris: Librairie des Champs-Élysées, published 1965, page 12:Cactus fait son apparition. C’est un être falot, au visage tavelé de taches de rousseur, qui s’occupe du courrier et des télégrammes. Il a un nom à coucher dehors, se terminant par « us », d’où son sobriquet s’alliant peu avec le personnage, lequel, entre nous, n’a rien de piquant.(please add an English translation of this quotation)

### Participle

piquant
* present participle of piquer

### Further reading

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

## Middle French
### Verb

piquant (feminine singular piquante, masculine plural piquans, feminine plural piquantes)
* present participle of piquer
* (may be preceded by en, invariable) gerund of piquer

### Adjective

piquant m (feminine singular piquante, masculine plural piquans, feminine plural piquantes)
* Alternative form of picquant