Meanings
plural sirventes
- historicalentertainmentA typically satirical song sung by the troubadours of Provence.
The knight in the meantime, had brought the strings into some order, and after a short prelude, asked his host whether he would choose a sirvente in the language of oc, or a lai in the language of oui, or a virelai, or a ballad in the vulgar English.
1819 December 20 (indicated as 1820), Walter Scott, chapter XVII, in Ivanhoe; a Romance. […], volume II, Edinburgh: […] Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Hurst, Robinson, and Co. […], →OCLC, page 421 more example
[T]here was a little, sleek, fat clerk of the name of Chaucer, who was so apt at rondel, sirvente, or tonson, that no man dare give back a foot from the walls, lest he find it all set down in his rhymes and sung by every underling and varlet in the camp.
1891, A[rthur] Conan Doyle, The White Company, New York, N.Y.; Boston, Mass.: Thomas Y[oung] Crowell & Company […], →OCLC, page 138
Origin
- Latinservīre
- Old Provençalsirventes
- Frenchsirvente
- Englishsirvente
Borrowed from French sirvente, from Old Provençal sirventes, sirventesc, originally, the poem of, or concerning, a sirvent, from sirvent, properly, serving, n., one who serves (e.g., as a soldier), from servir (“to serve”), from Latin servīre.
More words from French, Old Provençal, Latin
Full word history & related roots →Translations
Catalan sirventès
- sirventèssatirical song
French sirventès
- sirventèssatirical song
Italian sirventese
- sirventesesatirical song
Spanish sirventés
- sirventéssatirical song
Rhymes & wordplay
Anagrams
Cite this entry
sirvente. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/sirvente
“sirvente.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/sirvente. Accessed November 3, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “sirvente,” accessed November 3, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/sirvente.
Source: sirvente on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.