Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- adjective Thin or emaciated: synonym: lean.
- adjective Bleak or desolate.
from The Century Dictionary.
- Shrunken, as with fasting or suffering; emaciated; lean; thin; haggard.
- Characterized by or producing emaciation; famishing; attenuating: as, gaunt poverty.
- To make lean.
- See
gant . - noun The great crested grebe or cargoose, Podiceps cristatus.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- adjective Attenuated, as with fasting or suffering; lean; meager; pinched and grim.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- adjective
lean ,angular , andbony - adjective
haggard ,drawn , andemaciated - adjective
bleak ,barren , anddesolate
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- adjective very thin especially from disease or hunger or cold
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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Our young-old faces, chiseled and gaunt from the fever and the heat and the sleepless nights, now stare back at us, lost and damned strangers, frozen in yellowing snapshots packed away in cardboard boxes with our medals and our ribbons.
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Balding, gray-haired, just five feet eight in his stocking feet, he had what one journalist called the gaunt demeanor of a church elder.
In the Shadow of the Oval Office Ivo H. Daalder 2009
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Balding, gray-haired, just five feet eight in his stocking feet, he had what one journalist called the gaunt demeanor of a church elder.
In the Shadow of the Oval Office Ivo H. Daalder 2009
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Balding, gray-haired, just five feet eight in his stocking feet, he had what one journalist called the gaunt demeanor of a church elder.
In the Shadow of the Oval Office Ivo H. Daalder 2009
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Balding, gray-haired, just five feet eight in his stocking feet, he had what one journalist called the gaunt demeanor of a church elder.
In the Shadow of the Oval Office Ivo H. Daalder 2009
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Morgan recalled the gaunt anxiety of Mrs. Conboy's eyes, hollow of every emotion, as they seemed, but unrest and straining fear.
Trail's End George W. Ogden
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For the rest, I recall a gaunt Baptist in wood, said to be by Donatello, on one of the altars to the left of the choir; and the bronze Baptist in the Baptistery, less realistic, by Sansovino; the pretty figures of
A Wanderer in Venice Harry [Illustrator] Morley 1903
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The preacher at the Cross that day was a Black Friar -- a tall spare man, whom some might call gaunt and ungainly; a man of quick intelligence and radiant eyes, of earnest gesture and burning words.
For the Master's Sake A Story of the Days of Queen Mary Emily Sarah Holt 1864
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The suspect driving the vehicle was described as a gaunt, white male, with salt and pepper colored hair, approximately 50 years of age and had a deep pock mark scar on his left cheek.
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He looked "gaunt," Paola said, unshaven and much thinner than the Maziar she knows.
Waiting for Maziar 2009
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