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  1. simper love

Definitions

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

  1. v. To smile in a silly, self-conscious, often coy manner.
  2. v. To utter or express with a silly, self-conscious, often coy smile: simpered a lame excuse.
  3. n. A silly, self-conscious, often coy smile.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

  1. An obsolete or dialectal variant of simmer.
  2. To smile in an affected, silly manner; smirk.
  3. To twinkle; glimmer.
  4. Synonyms Simper and Smirk both express smiling; the primary idea of the first is silliness or simplicity; that of the second is affectation or conceit. The simplicity in simpering may be affected; the affectation in smirking may be of softness or of kindness.
  5. n. An affected, conscious smile; a smirk.

Wiktionary

  1. v. intransitive To smile in a foolish, frivolous, self-conscious, coy, or smug manner.
  2. n. A foolish, frivolous, self-conscious, or affected smile; a smirk.

GNU Webster's 1913

  1. v. To smile in a silly, affected, or conceited manner.
  2. v. obsolete To glimmer; to twinkle.
  3. n. A constrained, self-conscious smile; an affected, silly smile; a smirk.

WordNet 3.0

  1. n. a silly self-conscious smile
  2. v. smile affectedly or derisively

Etymologies

  1. Origin uncertain; compare (probably from) Danish simper / semper ("coy"), German zimper ("elegant, dainty"). (Wiktionary)
  2. Perhaps of Scandinavian origin. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)

Examples

  • “In the morning, before I got up, Strap came into my chamber, and, finding me awake, hemmed several times, scratched his head, cast his eyes upon the ground, and, with a very foolish kind of simper upon his face gave me to understand he had something to communicate.”

    The Adventures of Roderick Random

  • “There is nothing, for the conversation has been as lead, but the smile does not subside; it only passes through the endless variations that succeed each other from the inane grin to the affected simper which is meant to be tender.”

    Greifenstein

  • “Still, Pan Am and even the Playboy Club look like feminist manifestos in comparison with the new Charlie's Angels remake, which pulls off the improbable trick of apparently requiring its cast to wear less and simper more than they did the first time round.”

    The Guardian: The Playboy Club: men only

  • “On the other, she has a tendency to simper that can be a little grating.”

    23 « November « 2009 « The Manga Curmudgeon

  • “Christine O'Donnell and witchcraft, the brain-crushing demagoguery in August about the proposed mosque in Manhattan? it needs someone like Stewart or Colbert to step in and introduce perspective, and to expose what's happening for the nuttiness it is, while Democrats simper in the corner in fear of Fox News.”

    The Guardian: Jon Stewart still calls out to sensible America. Fox won't

  • “Is this what women are doing when they simper over bad boys – turning the female talent for self-loathing into an everyday hell for the women who actually end up dealing with them?”

    The Guardian: Idolising bad boys makes Charlies of us all | Barbara Ellen

  • “But I, and most right-thinking people, don't need the enjoyment of our lives intruded on by your constant, hectoring simper.”

    Archive 2009-02-01

  • “Topher slid up next to us with an apologetic simper.”

    Simon & Schuster: Brush of Darkness

  • “This was the point where a nice Indian girl would simper, demur, mumble, and dissemble.”

    Fictionaut: For the Sake of the Boy

  • “She wasn't chatty, didn't simper or giggle, wore no make-up.”

    Fictionaut: For the Sake of the Boy

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synonyms (4)

Words with the same meaning

  1. glimmer
  1. twinkle
  1. smirk
  1. smile

hypernyms (4)

Words that are more generic or abstract

  1. grinning
  1. smile
  1. smiling
  1. grin

same context (8)

Words that are found in similar contexts

  1. smirk
  1. snicker
  1. monolayer
  1. reboso
  1. expresser
  1. plaintiveness
  1. complacence
  1. tremulousness

rhymes (3)

Words with the same terminal sound

  1. Shrimper
  1. shrimper
  1. whimper

reverse dictionary (4)

Words that contain this word in their definition

  1. smirk
  1. simpering
  1. simper
  1. smile

tags (3)

Free-form, user-generated categorization

  1. smile
  1. recurrent
  1. SATWOTD

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‘simper’ has been looked up 6013 times, loved by 4 people, added to 78 lists, and has a Scrabble score of 10.