Pulchrous

Part of speech: adjective

Definitions

1. Exhibiting a visually appealing or lovely quality
2. Possessing a charming and attractive appearance that captivates the viewer
3. Displaying a strikingly pleasing or graceful visual appeal

Etymology: "Pulchrous" is a fairly rare English adjective built from the Latin "pulchrum," meaning "beautiful," with the English suffix "-ous," which turns a noun or adjective into a description of something that has or shows a quality. The result is a word that means, in effect, "full of beauty" or "beautifully made," the same idea carried by "bounteous" or "gorgeous" in their own ways. The stem goes back to Latin "pulcher," an adjective for beauty that English also took in its original form, for example in the word "pulchritude." Because "-ous" is so productive in English, a writer who already had "pulchritude" to hand could easily build an adjective from the same root. The Latin base itself is the older and more familiar part of the story; the adjective is a later English formation that reuses it.

Synonyms: beautiful, lovely, picturesque

Antonyms: ugly, unattractive