Word of the Day

Friday, November 10, 2000

visage

\VIZ-ij\ , noun;

The face, countenance, or look of a person or an animal; -- chiefly applied to the human face.

Look; appearance; aspect.

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Quotes:

Older than most, and taller -- taller than Perlman, in fact -- she had a long and lean visage that might once have passed for fair but which age had turned more knowing and severe.

-- Brooks Hansen, Perlman's Ordeal

I hadn't shaved in ever so long, either, but the way my whiskers grew I still looked more dirty than bearded to the quick glance I give my visage now and again when kneeling to drink in a stream slow-moving enough to reflect an image.

-- Thomas Berger, The Return of Little Big Man

The first extends from Poltava to the Congress of Vienna in 1814- 15, a period when Russia presents, in the guise of the "enlightened despotism" of Peter I, Catherine II, and the young Alexander I, the most benign visage she has ever displayed to the West.

-- Martin Malia, Russia Under Western Eyes

Origin:

Visage is from Old French, from vis, "face," from Latin visus, "seeing, sight, hence what is seen, appearance," from the past participle of videre, "to see."