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View synonyms for gaunt

gaunt

1

[ gawnt ]

adjective

, gaunt·er, gaunt·est.
  1. extremely thin and bony; haggard and drawn, as from great hunger, weariness, or torture; emaciated.

    Synonyms: rawboned, angular, lank, scrawny, spare, lean

    Antonyms: stout

  2. bleak, desolate, or grim, as places or things:

    a gaunt, windswept landscape.



Gaunt

2

[ gawnt, gahnt ]

noun

  1. John of. John of Gaunt.

gaunt

/ ɡɔːnt /

adjective

  1. bony and emaciated in appearance
  2. (of places) bleak or desolate
“Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged” 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012


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Derived Forms

  • ˈgauntness, noun
  • ˈgauntly, adverb
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Other Words From

  • gauntly adverb
  • gauntness noun
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Word History and Origins

Origin of gaunt1

First recorded in 1400–50; late Middle English, probably from Old French gaunet, jaunet “yellowish,” derivative of gaune, jaune “yellow,” from Latin galbinus “greenish-yellow”
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Word History and Origins

Origin of gaunt1

C15: perhaps of Scandinavian origin; compare Norwegian dialect gand tall lean person
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Synonym Study

See thin.
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Example Sentences

The socialite’s demeanor stood in stark contrast to earlier appearances in court, when she looked gaunt and disheveled and when her team accused jail guards of mistreating her.

You start losing all this weight and looking gaunt and frail.

One day I was stunned to see that a particular favorite was a gaunt chain-smoker.

In order to play the gaunt Woodroof, McConaughey went from 182 pounds to 135, subsisting on what he calls “a controlled diet.”

Hashi came in first, wearing a white kufi and looking gaunt, reportedly from a hunger strike.

In the small living room where we last met, he seemed more gaunt than wiry, his ear bandaged after a biopsy.

Charred beams and blackened walls showed stark and gaunt in the glow of a smoldering mass of wreckage.

The Seneschal stood with blanched face and gaping mouth, his fire all turned to ashes before the passion of this gaunt man.

A gaunt, hard-featured domestic completed this interesting family, and she was uncommon too.

The little name sounded so incongruous; it did not suit the big gaunt woman who had almost a touch of the monstrous in her.

He was tall and gaunt, with an unnaturally white face and a mass of hair almost as white in color, though not from age.

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