congee

plural congees · alternative conge · alternative congé

1. countableuncountableLeave, formal permission for some action, (originally and particularly)
2. Leave, formal permission for some action, (originally and particularly):
   1. countableobsoleteuncountableFormal permission to leave; a passport.
3. countableobsoleteuncountableFormal dismissal; (figurative) any dismissal; (originally & particularly humorously ironic) abrupt dismissal without ceremony.

   So courteous conge both did giue and take, With right hands plighted, pledges of good will.

   1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book II, Canto I”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC

4. countableobsoleteuncountableFormal leavetaking; (figurative) any farewell.
5. ScotlandcountableobsoleteuncountableA fee paid to make another go away, (particularly) alms to a persistent beggar.
6. archaiccountableuncountableA bow, curtsey, or other gesture (originally) made at departure but (later) including at greeting or in obeissance or respect.

   So saying, he bowed with a thousand apish congês, and presented his paper to Peregrine […].

   1751, [Tobias] Smollett, chapter 96, in The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle […], volume IV, London: Harrison and Co., […], →OCLC

   4 more examples

   As salutations, reverences, or conges, by which some doe often purchase the honour, (but wrongfully) to be humble, lowly, and courteous[…].

   1603, Michel de Montaigne, chapter 17, in John Florio, transl., The Essayes […], book II, London: […] Val[entine] Simmes for Edward Blount […], →OCLC

   … I therefore, at this time, shall only add this advice to you, under and by the leave of my lord;’ (and with that he made Diabolus a very low congee;) …

   1682, John Bunyan, The Holy War

   “My daughter Rebecca, so please your Grace,” answered Isaac, with a low congee, nothing embarrassed by the Prince’s salutation, in which, however, there was at least as much mockery as courtesy.

   1819 December 20 (indicated as 1820), Walter Scott, Ivanhoe; a Romance. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), Edinburgh: […] Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Hurst, Robinson, and Co. […], →OCLC

   His speech thus spake the Moor, and took his leave, he and his meiny where the bátels lay: formal farewells to chief and crews he gave, exchanging congees with due courtesy.

   1880, Richard Francis Burton, Os Lusíadas, volume I, page 23

present singular third person congees · participle present congeeing · participle past congeed · past congeed · alternative conge · alternative congé

1. To give congee, (particularly)
   1. archaicobsoletetransitiveTo give formal permission to leave; to dismiss.
   2. archaicobsoletetransitiveTo give formal permission to do something; to license.
2. archaicTo take congee: to leave ceremoniously.
3. archaicTo make a congee: to bow, curtsey, etc., (particularly dialectal) while leaving; (figuratively) to make obeissance, show respect, or defer to someone or something.

plural congees · alternative conjee

1. uncountableusuallyAsian cookingA type of thick rice porridge or soup, sometimes prepared with vegetables and/or meat.

   In a past life in Fuzhou, it represented some reality other than the one of daily congee and pickled turnips, cabbage and boiled rip soup.

   2022, Ling Ma, “Peking Duck”, in Bliss Montage, New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, →ISBN

   Synonyms: rice porridge, rice congee, porridge, zhou, jook, juk