swank
Part of speech: adj
noun
verb
Morphological type: simple
Etymology: From dialectal swank (“to strut, behave ostentatiously”), perhaps from an unrecorded Old English root, derived from Proto-Germanic *swankijaną (“to cause to sway, swing”) or from Proto-Germanic *swankaz (“lithe, bendsome, slender”), related to the Scots swank and the Middle High German swanken, modern German schwanken (“to sway”).
Inflected forms:
form: swanker
pos: adj
tags: comparative
form: swankest
pos: adj
tags: superlative
form: swanks
pos: noun
tags: plural
form: swanks
pos: verb
tags: present
singular
third-person
form: swanking
pos: verb
tags: participle
present
form: swanked
pos: verb
tags: participle
past
form: swanked
pos: verb
tags: past
Senses:
gloss: Fashionably elegant, posh.
pos: adj
examples: The fish house or shack is built without windows, covered with tar paper to keep out the light and wind, and set on the ice over about ten feet of water in a spot off shore where fish have been known to habitate habitually. […] A couple of boxes to sit on and a plank or mat for your feet and a small airtight stove, if you want swank comfort.
"You live in that swank apartment round the corner."
"Yes."
"Hey you must be rich."
You know it's swank when … It's very shiny / It's very tan / It's got Royale in its name
[T]he Montgomery Block was the commercial and social center of San Francisco. […] Above [the ground floor] were a law library, the three rooms of the Mercantile Library Association, and a swank billiard room that ran nearly the entire length of the second floor.
Mr. Heinz belonged to a very swank club in Pittsburgh.
She arrived at a very swank studio, where Mr. Feldman introduced himself as the director of auditions.
As we were enjoying this lovely meal, a very swank and sophisticated older woman came over to our table and excused herself, more so to Jerry than me.
Warren, Emerald City's owner, had thrown a swank party at his house and invited the whole staff, along with about fifty others.
gloss: A fashionably elegant person.
pos: noun
tags: countable
uncountable
examples: Us Morans don't like swanks, and that girl was a swank. Stuck-up rich girl. She wore a practically new gabardine with the same paper Union Jack flag as me, only hers was tucked into her coat buttonhole, behind a gold cat pasted with jewels.
gloss: Ostentation; bravado.
pos: noun
tags: countable
uncountable
examples: 'It is mere swank sending it to us,' said he. 'We have to be there whatever happens, as the hangman said to the murderer.'
Not even the effeminate swank of his riding clothes could hide the enormous power of that body—he seemed to fill those glistening boots until he strained the top lacing and you could see a great pack of muscle shifting when his shoulder moved under his thin coat.
Huge waves keep coming in over the front and I have seen the boat nearly go under any number of times. All the others pretend to take no notice of this, either from swank or because Harold says one of the most cowardly things ordinary people do is to shut their eyes to Facts.
gloss: To swagger, to show off.
pos: verb
examples: Looks like she's going to swank in, flashing her diamonds, then swank out to another party.
He was still an old galliard, with white Buffalo Bill vandyke, and he swanked around, still healthy of flesh, in white suits, looking things over with big sex-amused eyes.
[Peter] O'Toole does for this movie [My Favorite Year] what [Alan] Swann does for the cast and crew of Comedy Cavalcade: he swanks in whenever there's a lull in the action and with a dapper flare of his cuffs sets off smiles, sighs, palpitations.
With their innuendos and condemnations, with their loud-mouthed gabble, what a frighteningly learned lot they are – not quite clever, and not quite skilled. But still, it's woman's nature to swank; they swank because they're women, so let them swank. We won't take offence.
He hung up my coat – my shabby, two-seasons-old Gap coat – and it looked like the scruffy kid in class next to the fawn cashmere number swanking on the neighbouring peg.
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