Word of the Day

Friday, May 14, 2004

roue

\roo-AY\ , noun;

A man devoted to a life of sensual pleasure; a debauchee; a rake.

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Quotes:

I spent some time with Desmond, an old roue who was recovering from a lifetime of excesses in a village near Fontainebleau.

-- Roger Scruton, "Purely medicinal", New Statesman, October 15, 2001

She caught the eye of New York aristocrat Gouverneur Morris, ex-U.S. Minister to France, a one-legged cosmopolitan roue. (Rumor had it that a jealous husband had shot Morris's leg off.)

-- Bill Kauffman, "Unwise Passions", American Enterprise, January 2001

Yet he acted the roue to the end, carrying on an intimate liaison with a girl who worked at the asylum -- he was 74, she was 17.

-- Rex Roberts, "Write Stuff", Insight on the News, December 11, 2000

Origin:

Roue comes from French, from the past participle of rouer, "to break upon the wheel" (from the feeling that a roue deserves such a punishment), ultimately from Latin rota, "wheel."