Word: gaunt Part of Speech: adj Etymology: From Middle English gaunt, gawnt, gawnte, gant (“lean, slender, thin, gaunt”); further etymology uncertain. Speculated origins include: * from a North Germanic/Scandinavian source related to Old Norse gandr (“magic staff; stick”) (the ancestor of Icelandic gandur (“magic staff”) and Norwegian gand (“thin, pointed stick; tall, thin man”)), from Proto-Germanic *gandaz (“stick; staff”). Other suggested Germanic cognates include Swedish gank (“(dialectal) lean, emaciated horse”); Danish gand, gan, Norwegian gana (“cut-off tree limbs”); Bavarian Gunten (“kind of peg or wedge”). These words have all been connected to *gunþiz (“battle”) or its ultimate source, but this comparison presents semantic and phonetic difficulties. * from Old French: ** The NED/OED (1900) suggests it could be a "graphic adoption" of Old French gant, a variant spelling of gent (“elegant; nice, pleasant; noble”) modern French gent), from Latin gēns (“clan, tribe; country, nation; family; people”), from Proto-Italic *gentis, from Proto-Indo-European *ǵénh₁tis, from the root *ǵenh₁- (“to produce, to beget, to give birth”). (It could not be an oral borrowing since the Old French word started with [dʒ], not [ɡ], due to the palatalization of Latin "ge"; compare jaunty from French gentil.) If this etymology is correct, the early, now-obsolete positive or neutral sense 4.1 ("slender") was apparently original. ** Spitzer 1944 argues it is more likely to be from the Norman version of Old French jau(l)net (“yellowish”), diminutive of jaune (“yellow”), from Latin galbinus (the palatalization of Latin "ga" did not occur in northern French dialects). Pronunciation: /ɡɔːnt/, /ɡɑːnt/, /ɡɔnt/, /ɡɑnt/ 1. Angular, bony, and lean. Example: [H]e presented for the first time to Mannering his tall, gaunt, awkward, boney figure, attired in a threadbare suit of black, […] Example: Hanging from the beam, / Slowly swaying (such the law), / Gaunt the shadow on your green, / Shenandoah! 2. Unhealthily thin, as from hunger or illness: drawn, emaciated, haggard. Example: Old Gaunt indeede, and gaunt in being olde: / VVithin me Griefe hath kept a tedious faſt. / And vvho abſtaines from meate that is not gaunt? / For ſleeping England long time haue I vvatcht, / VVatching breedes leaneneſſe, leaneneſſe is all gaunt: / The pleaſure that ſome fathers feede vpon / Is my ſtrict faſt; I meane my childrens lookes, / And therein faſting haſt thou made me gaunt: / Gaunt am I for the graue, gaunt as a graue, / VVhoſe hollovv vvombe inherites naught but bones. Example: VVhen once he [a horse]'s broken, feed him full and high: / Indulge his Grovvth, and his gaunt ſides ſupply. 3. Of a place or thing: bleak, desolate. Labels: figuratively Example: But all that night, waking or in my sleep, the same thoughts recurred and the same images retained possession of my brain. I had ever before me the old dark murky rooms—the gaunt suits of mail with their ghostly silent air—the faces all awry, grinning from wood and stone— […] Example: Ready-money Mortiboy's parlour is a gaunt, cold room, with long, narrow windows, wire blinds, horsehair chairs, a horsehair sofa, red moreen curtains, and a round table with a red cover reaching to the floor. 4. Greedy; also, hungry, ravenous. Labels: figuratively, rare Example: Gorg'd vvith our plunder, yet ſtill gaunt for ſpoil, / Rapacious G—d—n faſtens on our iſle; […] 5. With a positive or neutral connotation: not overweight; lean, slender, slim. Labels: obsolete Example: I know where a woman was got with child, and was ashamed at the matter, and went into a secret place, where she had no woman at her travail, and was delivered of three children at a birth. She wrung their necks, and cast them into a water, and so killed her children: suddenly she was gaunt again, and her neighbours suspecting the matter, caused her to be examined, and she granted all: […] Example: [T]hey vvho feed overmuch, and deſire to be gant and ſlender, and vvithall, to be coſtive, ought to forbear drinking at meales, ſo long as they eat, but after meat they may drink moderatly. To drinke vvine upon an emptie ſtomacke faſting, is a nevv found deviſe lately come up, and it is moſt unholeſome for the bodie, […] 6. Of a sound: suggesting bleakness and desolation. Labels: figuratively, obsolete Example: To the shouting throng / My fancy hears a dismal voice reply, / Like the gaunt echo of a hollow tomb.— […]