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curtsey

curt·sey

Today it means: A small bow, generally performed by a woman or a girl, where she crosses the shin of one leg behind the calf of her other leg and briefly bends her knees to lower her body in deference. Full definition →

Middle English curteisie ← Anglo-Norman curtesie ← Old French curteisie

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The story

Old French · derived fromcurteisie
Anglo-Norman · derived fromcurtesie
Middle English · inherited fromcurteisie
English todaycurtsey

Variant of courtesy (1525) (from court + -esy), from Middle English curteisie, curtesie, from Anglo-Norman curtesie, from Old French curteisie, cortoisie.

Words from the same roots

Middle Englishcurteisie all →

Anglo-Normancurtesie all →

Old Frenchcurteisie all →

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.