Added 5 October 2026
glamour
/ˈɡlæmə/ noun
In Latin: nitor Wiktionary
noun Definition from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA). Pronunciation from Wiktionary, via Kaikki.org. More about glamour at Wordnik → Where our words come from →
- Originally, enchantment; magic charm; especially, the effect of a spell that causes one to see objects in a form that differs from reality, typically to make filthy, ugly, or repulsive things seem beauteous.
-
Alluring beauty or charm (often with sex appeal).
glamour magazines; a glamour model
-
Any excitement, appeal, or attractiveness associated with a person, place, or thing; that which makes something appealing.
The idea of being a movie star has lost its glamour for me.
verb
- To enchant; to bewitch.
- ↑ Postrel, Virginia (5 November 2013), “One: The Magic of Glamour”, in The Power of Glamour: Longing and the Art of Visual Persuasion, Simon & Schuster, →ISBN: “Reflecting this sense of the word, by 1902 Webster's included two new definitions: “a kind of haze in the air, causing things to appear different from what they really are”…”
Origin
Borrowed from Scots glamour (“magic”), alteration of Middle English gramere (“grammar”), from Old French gramaire. Doublet of glamoury, gramarye, grammar, and grimoire. A connection has also been suggested with Old Norse glámr (“the moon", also "the name of a ghost”, poetic byname, literally “the pale one”) and glámsýni (“glamour, illusion”, literally “glam-sight”). From Grettir's Saga aka Grettis Saga, one of the Sagas of Icelanders, after the hero has been cursed by Glam, aka Glamr: "...he was become so fearsome a man in the dark, that he durst go nowhither alone after nightfall, for then he seemed to see all kinds of horrors.
From Wiktionary, via Kaikki.org (CC BY-SA)