Word of the Day

: July 28, 2024

dulcet

adjective DUL-sut

What It Means

Dulcet is a formal word used to describe sounds that are pleasant to hear. It is often used in the phrase “dulcet tones.”

// Jolie recalled warm memories of falling asleep to the dulcet tones of her grandmother’s lullabies.

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dulcet in Context

“It’s an understatement to say that Paris Is Burning was everything to me. Seeing it finally put a name on what I had somehow known existed perhaps through family conversations, run-ins in the city, and pop cultural dots connected over a couple decades of life—BALLROOM. I was finally able to say, ‘There it is!’ My takeaways from that cult classic are numerous: The dulcet tones of Pepper LaBeija, draped in silk in a lamplit corner, chain-smoking and unravelling the yarn of how she became the next mother of the very first house in Ballroom, the House of LaBeija.” — Ricky Tucker, And the Category Is… : Inside New York’s Vogue, House, and Ballroom Community, 2021

Did You Know?

Some of the most dulcet tones in American folk music are said to come from the dulcimer, a fretted stringed instrument traditionally played on the lap and integral to the work of such sweet-voiced musicians and song collectors as Jean Ritchie, Loraine Wyman, and Margaret MacArthur. The essence of dulcet, after all, is sweetness; the word has been in use in English since the 1400s describing not only desserts and other confections that are pleasing for their literal sweetness, but figuratively sweet things such as smiles and even balmy weather. Dulcet is today used most often, however, to describe sounds, including melodies, voices, and especially tones with a notably honeyed quality. Fittingly, dulcet comes from the Latin word for “sweet,” dulcis, an ancestor of many musical English words, including the musical direction dolce (“to be played sweetly”), Dulciana (a type of pipe organ stop), dolcian (a small bassoon-like instrument), and, of course, dulcimer.