clinquant

From French clinquant, from clinquer (“to clink”), from Dutch klinken (“to sound, ring, clink”), from Middle Dutch clinken, clingen, from Old Dutch *clingan, from Proto-West Germanic *klingan, from Proto-Germanic *klinganą (“to sound, ring”). Cognate with German klingen (“to sound”).

• IPA^(key): /ˈklɪŋkənt/

clinquant (comparative more clinquant, superlative most clinquant)

1. Glittery; gleaming; sparkling; dressed in, or overlaid with, tinsel finery.
   • 1613 (date written), William Shakespeare, [John Fletcher], “The Famous History of the Life of King Henry the Eight”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene i], lines 18–20:

     Today the French, / All clinquant, all in gold, like heathen gods, / Shone down the English;

clinquant (uncountable)

1. Dutch metal.
2. Tinsel; glitter.
   • 1806 [a. 1681], Lucy Hutchinson, Memoirs of the Life of Colonel Hutchinson, 3rd edition, volume 2, Longman, Hurst, Bees, and Orme, published 1810, page 177:

     Harrison came that day in a scarlett coate and cloake, both laden with gold and silver lace, and the coate so cover'd with clinquant, that scarcely could one discerne the ground,

   • 1762, George Vertue, Horace Walpole, Some Anecdotes of Painting in England, volume 2, published 1849, page 442:

     Lely supplied the want of taste with clinquant; his nymphs trail fringes and embroidery through meadows and purling streams.