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Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary beau·ti·ful DATE 15th century 1. having qualities of beauty : exciting aesthetic pleasure 2. generally pleasing : excellent Synonyms. beautiful , lovely , handsome , pretty , comely , fair mean exciting sensuous or aesthetic pleasure. beautiful applies to whatever excites the keenest of pleasure to the senses and stirs emotion through the senses beautiful mountain scenery lovely is close to beautiful but applies to a narrower range of emotional excitation in suggesting the graceful, delicate, or exquisite a lovely melody handsome suggests aesthetic pleasure due to proportion, symmetry, or elegance a handsome Georgian mansion pretty often applies to superficial or insubstantial attractiveness a painter of conventionally pretty scenes comely is like handsome in suggesting what is coolly approved rather than emotionally responded to the comely grace of a dancer fair suggests beauty because of purity, flawlessness, or freshness fair of face English Etymology beautiful 1520s, from beauty + -ful. Beautiful people "the fashionable set" first attested 1964 in (where else?) "Vogue." House Beautiful is from "Pilgrim's Progress," where it is a proper name of a place. Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary-牛津双解-OALD7 ☞ beautiful beau·ti·ful / 5bju:tifl / adjective1. having beauty; pleasing to the senses or to the mind 美丽的；美好的: a beautiful woman / face / baby / voice / poem / smell / evening 漂亮的女人/面孔/婴儿；美妙的声音/诗歌/香味/夜晚 beautiful countryside / weather / music 美丽的乡村；美好的天气；美妙的音乐 2. very good or skilful 很好的；出色的；巧妙的: What beautiful timing! 时间把握得正好！ Oxford Collocations Dictionary for Students of English beautiful adj. VERBS be, feel, look, seem | become, grow | make sb/sth We did all we could to make the room beautiful. | find sb/sth He found her exquisitely beautiful. ADV. exceptionally, extraordinarily, extremely, outstandingly, really, remarkably, supremely, truly, very | absolutely, perfectly, quite, utterly | just, simply (informal) ‘They're just beautiful,’ breathed Jo, when she saw the earrings. | almost I remember her as pretty, almost beautiful. | rather | astonishingly, breathtakingly, dazzlingly, incredibly, staggeringly, startlingly, strikingly, stunningly, unbelievably, wonderfully | uniquely | exquisitely | serenely | classically Her features were classically beautiful, with perfectly structured high cheekbones. | coldly The designs were pure, austere and coldly beautiful. | achingly, eerily, hauntingly, painfully a hauntingly beautiful melody OLT beautiful adj. ⇨ beautiful 1 (a beautiful woman)⇨ beautiful 2 (a beautiful place) Webster's Third New International Dictionary, Unabridged beau·ti·ful I. \ˈbyüd.ə̇fəl, -yütə̇- also -yüd.ēf-, -yütēf-\ adjective (sometimes -er/-est) Etymology: beauty + -ful 1. : marked by beauty: a. : keenly delighting the senses as approaching perfection or the ideal in form, proportion, arrangement, grace, color, or sound < seldom have I seen … so beautiful a face. She was a blonde, golden-haired, blue-eyed — A. Conan Doyle > < the Song of Songs, beautiful, orientally sensuous, too glowing perhaps for western taste — H.O.Taylor > < a beautiful sonorous and flexible language — H.T.Buckle > b. : delighting with a higher, more exalted appeal : calling forth great spiritual, intellectual, and aesthetic appreciation : lofty in effect < an Aquinas in his cell before a crucifix or a Narcissus … equally beautiful — W.H.Mallock > 2. a. : attractive or impressive through expressing or suggesting fitness, order, regularity, rhythm, cogency, or perfection of structure < this most beautiful system of the sun, planets, and comets — Isaac Newton > < the deep canyon of Broadway, between those vast structures, beautiful but sinister — P.E.More > < his arguments were beautiful and deserved to be true — Francis Galton > b. : perfect, nearly perfect, or extremely attractive through such qualities as honesty, devotion, charity, or self-sacrifice < young children not infrequently have an exquisitely beautifulsaintliness of character — W.R.Inge > c. : marked by practically perfect unerring art, skill, finesse, technique, or polish < he made a beautiful shot on that leopard — Ernest Hemingway > < its accurate and beautiful record of folk dialect — American Guide Series: Ind. > < a beautiful book so technically perfect that the professional writer stands in awe of it — Saturday Review > d. : perfect as an illustration : outstanding as a type or model < a case of disease may be so typical in its exhibition of characteristic relations as to be called beautiful — John Dewey > 3. : generally pleasing : fine , excellent , delectable : superlatively good : lacking anything detracting from enjoyment < beautiful weather > < a beautiful friendship > < a beautiful roast turkey > Synonyms: lovely , beauteous , pulchritudinous , pretty , comely , bonny , fair , handsome , good-looking : beautiful , wide in its application and extreme in praise, describes a close approach to an ideal and indicates a quite keen delight in contemplation < O Cynthia, ten times bright and fair! … too divine art thou, too keen in beauty … how beautiful thou art — John Keats > < after nursery rhymes they should learn equally beautiful songs — Bertrand Russell > < the Deanery is now a beautiful private residence with herbaceous borders — E.V.Lucas > lovely suggests sensuous or emotional delights < Freydis now showed as the most lovely of womenkind. She had black plaited hair, and folds of crimson silk were over her white flesh, and over her shoulders was a black coat embroidered with little gold stars — J.B.Cabell > beauteous , a rather literary word, and pulchritudinous , a relatively new word uncommon outside journalism, stress rich appeal < young maidens came, beauteous and calm, like shapes of living stone, clothed in the light of dreams — P.B.Shelley > pretty suggests presence of grace, charm, vivacity, daintiness, or petiteness, an absence of perfection, ideality, stateliness, and dignity < she was pretty at all times … with her light-brown ringlets, her delicately tinged but healthful cheek, her sensitive, intelligent, yet most feminine and kindly face. But every few moments, the pretty and girlish face grew beautiful and striking, as some inward thought and feeling brightened, rose to the surface — Nathaniel Hawthorne > < as a pretty household toy, Pussy was carried from Africa to Europe — Agnes Repplier > comely and bonny , which has a Scotch suggestion, stress pleasant wholesomeness and fitness < a quick brunette, well molded, falcon-eyed. … ‘Comely, too, by all that's fair’ — Alfred Tennyson > < your bonny face sae mild and sweet his honest heart enamors — Robert Burns > fair , less common as a synonym for beautiful in today's English, may suggest lightness or freshness < the girl was certainly fair to look upon. Many heavens were in her sunny eyes, and the outline of that arm of hers … was the very curve of beauty — Herman Melville > The words preceding refer more commonly to women than to men; handsome and good-looking refer about equally to men, women, and things. handsome suggests a pleasing appearance, due proportions, and a measure of dignity and taste < Cleveland was … a he-man, handsome with a certain bull-like pulchritude, which was the outer symbol of his inner courage — W.A.White > < she was very handsome; a bold beauty, with shining black hair, red lips, and eyes not afraid of men — George Meredith > < handsome houses rich in mahogany, plate, and pier glasses — Allan Nevins & H.S.Commager > good-looking is less expressive and is not rich in especial connotations < a good-looking young fellow of twenty-five. His cheeks were dyed with fine Saxon red … his blue eye opened well, and a profusion of fair hair curled over a well-shaped head — Herman Melville > II. noun (-s) : the abstract or ideal essence or principle of that which appeals to aesthetic tastes and dispositions — used with the < studying the beautiful > |
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