rendezvous

• randezvous (archaic)
• rendez-vous

Borrowed from French rendez-vous (“appointment”), noun derived from second person plural imperative of se rendre (“to go to”), literally, “[you (imperative)] go to, get yourself to [a place]”.

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈɹɒndɪˌvuː/, /ˈɹɒndeɪ̯ˌvuː/
• (US) IPA^(key): /ˈɹɑndəˌvu/, /ˈɹɑndeɪ̯ˌvu/

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rendezvous (plural rendezvous or (rare) rendezvouses)

1. A meeting or date.

   I have a rendezvous with a friend in three hours.

   • 1845, Dublin University Magazine, volume 25, page 39:

     The hare lends its form to the witch for her twilight flittings and scuddings to the place of some unhallowed rendezvous.

   • 1984, Ric Ocasek, “You Might Think”, in Heartbeat City‎, performed by The Cars:

     You might think it's foolish / This chancy rendezvous / (You might think) You might think I'm crazy / (All I want) All I want is you

2. An agreement to meet at a certain place and time.

   Get the party started at the rendezvous at oh six hours.

3. A place appointed for a meeting, or at which persons customarily meet.
   • 1821 January 8, [Walter Scott], Kenilworth; a Romance. […], volumes (please specify |volume=I to III), Edinburgh: […] Archibald Constable and Co.; and John Ballantyne, […]; London: Hurst, Robinson, and Co., →OCLC:

     an inn, the free rendezvous of all travellers

4. (military) The appointed place for troops, or for the ships of a fleet, to assemble; also, a place for enlistment.
   • 1702–1704, Edward [Hyde, 1st] Earl of Clarendon, “(please specify |book=I to XVI)”, in The History of the Rebellion and Civil Wars in England, Begun in the Year 1641. […], Oxford, Oxfordshire: Printed at the Theater, published 1707, →OCLC:

     The king appointed his whole army to be drawn together to a rendezvous at Marlborough.

5. (astronautics) A set of orbital maneuvers during which two spacecraft arrive at the same orbit and approach to a very close distance.
6. (obsolete) A retreat or refuge.
   • c. 1597 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The First Part of Henry the Fourth, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act IV, scene i]:

     A rendeuous, a home to fly unto

The plural form of rendezvous (/-vu/) is normally rendezvous (/-vuz/ or /-vu/). Rarely, the form rendezvouses is encountered.

• (military): RV (abbreviation)

• → Welsh: rondefŵ
• → Welsh: randibŵ

rendezvous (third-person singular simple present rendezvouses or rendezvous, present participle rendezvousing, simple past and past participle rendezvoused)

1. (intransitive) To meet at an agreed time and place.

   Let's rendezvous at the bordello at 8:00 and go from there.

   • 1760–1765, Tobias Smollett, The History of England‎, volume 2:

     At Boston in New England, they were joined by two regiments of provincials; and about four thousand men, consisting of American planters, Palatines, and Indians, rendezvoused at Albany, in order to march by land into Canada, while the fleet sailed up the river of that name.

   • 2002, Michel Faber, The Crimson Petal and the White, Canongate Books (2010), page 392:

     In the entrance-hall, a surprising number of opera-goers have already rendezvoused.

   • 2024 February 16, Minju Pak, “Ode to a Punk Rock ‘Sex God’”, in The New York Times‎, →ISSN:

     They saw each other four times after that, rendezvousing at New York locations reflecting their own tastes. For him, the Knickerbocker Bar & Grill; for her, the Standard and Ludlow hotels.

• rendez-vous for French definition, spelling, and pronunciation

• rendez-vous

• IPA^(key): [ˈrandɛvuː]

rendezvous n (indeclinable)

1. date, appointment (meeting with a lover or potential lover)

   Synonym: rande

• rendezvous in Příruční slovník jazyka českého, 1935–1957

Borrowed from French rendez-vous.

rendezvous n (singular definite rendezvouset or rendezvous'et, plural indefinite rendezvouser or rendezvous'er)

1. rendezvous

• stævnemøde
• date