dapper: [15] Modern English dapper connotes neatness, alertness, and liveliness, but its etymological significance as revealed by distant relatives such as Old High German tapfar ‘heavy’, Old Prussian debīkan ‘large’, and Old Slavic debelu ‘thick’, is ‘heavy’. The notion of ‘weightiness’ spread to ‘firmness, endurance in battle’, and hence ‘courage’ (German tapfer and Dutch dapper both mean ‘brave’). English acquired the word, with an apparently ironical change of meaning, from Middle Dutch or Middle Low German dapper ‘heavy, stout, bold’.
dapper (adj.)
mid-15c., "elegant," from Middle Dutch or Middle Low German dapper "bold, strong, sturdy," later "quick, nimble," from Proto-Germanic *dapraz, perhaps with ironical shift of meaning (cognates: Old High German tapfar "heavy," German tapfer "brave"), from PIE root *dheb- "dense, firm, compressed."
雙語例句
1. He is a dapper little salesman in a business suit.
他是一個穿西裝的矮小精悍的推銷員.
來自《簡明英漢詞典》
2. He was a dapper little Irishman, very vain, homely as a monkey.
他是個短小精干的愛爾蘭人, 非常自負, 丑得象只猴子.
來自辭典例句
3. His manner was aristocratic , his movements dapper and suave.
他氣宇軒昂, 溫文爾雅,舉止瀟灑.
來自辭典例句
4. The once dapper , cheerful agent had become seedy looking and bitter.
昔日風度翩翩、容光煥發的經紀人,今天變成了衣衫褸襤, 蓬頭垢面的人.
來自辭典例句
5. His dapper self - confidence seemed impenetrable to such hints.