Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- adjective Cut low at the neckline.
- adjective Wearing a garment that is low-cut or strapless.
from The Century Dictionary.
- Low-necked: said of a dress-waist so shaped as to leave the neck and shoulders exposed.
- By extension, having the neck and shoulders exposed: said of a woman the waist of whose dress is cut low in the neck.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- adjective Leaving the neck and shoulders uncovered; cut low in the neck, or low-necked, as a dress.
- adjective Wearing a décolleté gown.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- adjective Having a low
neckline that reveals thecleavage .
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- adjective (of a garment) having a low-cut neckline
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
[French, past participle of décolleter, to lower a neckline, uncover the neck : dé-, off (from Latin dē-; see de–) + collet, collar (from Old French, diminutive of col, neck, collar, from Latin collum, neck; see kwel- in Indo-European roots).]
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
Borrowing from French, from décolleter ("to bare the neck and shoulders").
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Examples
Sorry, no example sentences found.
qms commented on the word décolleté
Sophisticates turn bored away
On seeing what some think risqué:
A skirt that’s split high
For a glimpse of a thigh
Or top that is décolleté.
February 10, 2018
qms commented on the word décolleté
Two notes on decollete/décolleté: I assume that the unaccented version exists only because of US publishers’ misguided aversion to French accents. I have never heard ir pronounced as though unaccented. Also, it is defined here as an adjective but is frequently used as a noun.
February 10, 2018