decorum

plural decora · plural decorums

1. uncountableAppropriate social behavior.

   It was sort of a finishing school. You know, to teach proper social decorum and so on and so forth.

   2010, Pseudonymous Bosch (pseudonym; Raphael Simon), This Isn't What It Looks Like, ch. 4

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   Everyone was assembled in the dining-room. Under the circumstances, we were naturally not a cheerful party. The reaction after a shock is always trying, and I think we were all suffering from it. Decorum and good breeding naturally enjoined that our demeanour should be much as usual, yet I could not help wondering if this self-control were really a matter of great difficulty. There were no red eyes, no signs of secretly indulged grief.

   1920, Agatha Christie, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, London: Pan Books, published 1954, page 57

   Synonyms: decency, courtesy, propriety, etiquette

2. countableA convention of social behavior.

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   In the architecture and embellishments of the chamber, the evident design was to dazzle and astound. Little attention had been paid to the decora of what is technically called “keeping,” or to the proprieties of nationality. The eye wandered from object to object, and rested upon none; neither the “Grotesques” of the Greek painters, nor the sculptures of the best Italian days, nor the huge carvings of untutored Egypt.

   1834 January, [Edgar Allan Poe], “The Visionary”, in The Lady’s Book, page 41, column 2