smirk
English
Alternative forms
- smerk (dated) smirke (archaic)
Etymology
From Middle English smirken, from Old English smearcian (“to smile”), corresponding to smerian + -cian (English -k; compare talk and stalk from, respectively, tell and steal). The former element from Proto-Germanic *smarōną (“to mock, scoff at”), and the latter from Proto-Germanic *-kōną. Compare Middle High German smielen/smieren (“to smile”) ( > obsolete, rare German schmieren). Doublet of smile.
The specific meaning of a mocking or unpleasant, malicious smile or grin develops in Early Modern English, but until the 18th century, it could still be used to describe a generic smile.[1]
Pronunciation
- (Received Pronunciation) IPA(key): /smɜːk/
Audio (Southern England): (file)
- (General American) IPA(key): /smɝk/
- Rhymes: -ɜː(ɹ)k
Noun
smirk (plural smirks)
- An uneven, often crooked smile that is insolent, self-satisfied, conceited or scornful.
- A forced or affected smile.
- Synonyms: simper, (vulgar) shit-eating grin
- 1814 July 7, [Walter Scott], Waverley; or, ’Tis Sixty Years Since. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), Edinburgh: […] James Ballantyne and Co. for Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, →OCLC:
- The bride, all smirk and blush, had just entered.
- 2003, Brian Herbert, “Xanadu”, in Dreamer of Dune[2], New York: Tom Doherty Associates, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 259:
- We sat at a long table with a huge salmon on a platter in the center, prepared Szechuan style. Dad sat at one end of the table, and regaled all present with his stories. In the middle of one convoluted yarn, he rose and went around to the salmon in the center of the table. Using his fingers, he dug an eyeball out of the fish, popped it in his mouth and swallowed it whole as we looked on, aghast. “A real delicacy,” he said, with a boyish smirk.
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Verb
smirk (third-person singular simple present smirks, present participle smirking, simple past and past participle smirked)
- To smile in a way that is affected, smug, insolent or contemptuous.
Synonyms
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Adjective
smirk (comparative more smirk, superlative most smirk)
- (obsolete) smart; spruce; affected; simpering
- 1579, Immeritô [pseudonym; Edmund Spenser], “Februarie. Aegloga Se[c]unda.”, in The Shepheardes Calender: […], London: […] Iohn Wolfe for Iohn Harrison the yonger, […], →OCLC:
- So smirk, so smooth, his pricked Ears.