glamour

What it means

1. uncountableOriginally, enchantment; magic charm; especially, the effect of a spell that causes one to see objects in a form that differs from reality, typically to make filthy, ugly, or repulsive things seem beauteous.

   1 more example

   They often murmur to themselves, they speak To one another seldom, for their woe Broods maddening inwardly and scorns to wreak Itself abroad; and if at whiles it grow To frenzy which must rave, none heeds the clamour, Unless there waits some victim of like glamour, To rave in turn, who lends attentive show.

   1882, James Thomson (B. V.), The City of Dreadful Night

2. uncountableAlluring beauty or charm (often with sex appeal).

   glamour magazines; a glamour model

3. uncountableAny excitement, appeal, or attractiveness associated with a person, place, or thing; that which makes something appealing.

   The idea of being a movie star has lost its glamour for me.

   2 more examples

   “The North Pole was one of these places, I remember. Well, I haven’t been there yet, and shall not try now. The glamour’s off.”

   1899 February, Joseph Conrad, “The Heart of Darkness”, in Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine, volume CLXV, number M, New York, N.Y.: The Leonard Scott Publishing Company, […], →OCLC, part I, page 197

   Boys have not lost their love for adventure, and still have `itchy feet.' Many are seeking glamor jobs, want to be writers, detectives, seamen.

   1950 May 7, The Daily Telegraph, Sydney, page 13, column 3

In a sentence

They often murmur to themselves, they speak To one another seldom, for their woe Broods maddening inwardly and scorns to wreak Itself abroad; and if at whiles it grow To frenzy which must rave, none heeds the clamour, Unless there waits some victim of like glamour, To rave in turn, who lends attentive show.

1882, James Thomson (B. V.), The City of Dreadful Night

Where it comes from

1. Old Norseglámr“the moon", also "the name of a ghost”
2. Old Frenchgramaire
3. Middle Englishgramere“grammar”
4. Scotsglamour“magic”
5. Englishglamour

Borrowed from Scots glamour (“magic”), alteration of Middle English gramere (“grammar”), from Old French gramaire. Doublet of glamoury, gramarye, grammar, and grimoire. A connection has also been suggested with Old Norse glámr (“the moon", also "the name of a ghost”, poetic byname, literally “the pale one”) and glámsýni (“glamour, illusion”, literally “glam-sight”). From Grettir's Saga aka Grettis Saga, one of the Sagas of Icelanders, after the hero has been cursed by Glam, aka Glamr: "...he was become so fearsome a man in the dark, that he durst go nowhither alone after nightfall, for then he seemed to see all kinds of horrors. And that has fallen since into a proverb, that "Glam lends eyes", or gives Glamsight to those who see things nowise as they are."