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Webster 1913 Edition


Varlet

Var′let

,
Noun.
[OF.
varlet
,
vaslet
,
vallet
, servant, young man, young noble, dim. of
vassal
. See
Vassal
, and cf.
Valet
.]
1.
A servant, especially to a knight; an attendant; a valet; a footman.
[Obs.]
Spenser. Tusser.
2.
Hence, a low fellow; a scoundrel; a rascal;
as, an impudent
varlet
.
What a brazen-faced
varlet
art thou !
Shakespeare
3.
In a pack of playing cards, the court card now called the
knave
, or
jack
.
[Obs.]

Webster 1828 Edition


Varlet

V'ARLET

,
Noun.
[See Valet.]
1.
Anciently, a servant or footman.
2.
A scoundrel; a rascal; as an impudent varlet.

Definition 2024


varlet

varlet

English

Noun

varlet (plural varlets)

  1. (obsolete) A servant or attendant.
    • 1843, Thomas Carlyle, Past and Present, book 2, ch. 8, The Electon
      The Winchester Manorhouse has fled bodily, like a Dream of the old Night (...) . House and people, royal and episcopal, lords and varlets, where are they?
  2. (historical) Specifically, a youth acting as a knight's attendant at the beginning of his training for knighthood.
  3. (archaic) A rogue or scoundrel.
    • 1749, Henry Fielding, Tom Jones, Folio Society 1973, p. 410:
      My lady to be called a nasty Scotch wh–re by such a varlet!—To be sure I wish I had knocked his brains out with the punchbowl.
    • 1886, Henry James, The Bostonians.
      He was false, cunning, vulgar, ignoble; the cheapest kind of human product.... The white, puffy mother, with the high forehead, in the corner there, looked more like a lady; but if she were one, it was all the more shame to her to have mated with such a varlet, Ransom said to himself, making use, as he did generally, of terms of opprobrium extracted from the older English literature.
  4. (obsolete, card games) The jack.

Translations

Anagrams


Old French

Noun

varlet m (oblique plural varlez or varletz, nominative singular varlez or varletz, nominative plural varlet)

  1. Alternative form of vaslet