Crossword clues for cicisbeo
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Cicisbeo \Ci`cis*be"o\, n.; pl. It. Cicisbei. [It.]
A professed admirer of a married woman; a dangler about women.
A knot of silk or ribbon attached to a fan, walking stick, etc. [Obs.]
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
1718, from Italian cicisbeo "the recognized gallant of a married woman." Perhaps from older French chiche beau "little man," or from Venetian dialect cici "the chattering of women" (imitative, attested in 18c.).
Wiktionary
n. 1 (context 18th century English) A knightly servant of a high-born lady. 2 A married woman's lover; a kept man.
Wikipedia
In 18th- and 19th-century Italy, the cicisbeo (; plural: cicisbei), or cavalier servente'' (chevalier servant'' in French), was the professed gallant and lover of a married woman, who attended her at public entertainments, to church and other occasions and had privileged access to his mistress. The arrangement is comparable to the Spanish cortejo or estrecho and, to a lesser degree, to the French petit-maître. The exact etymology of the word is unknown; some evidence suggests it originally meant "in a whisper" (perhaps an onomatopeic word). Other accounts suggest it is an inversion of bel cece, which means "beautiful chick (pea)". According to OED, the first recorded usage of the term in English was found in a letter by Lady Mary Wortley Montagu dated 1718. The term appears in Italian in Giovanni Maria Muti's "Quaresimale Del Padre Maestro Fra Giovanni Maria Muti De Predicatori" of 1708 (p. 734).
Usage examples of "cicisbeo".
Was he thinking of hiring him to play attendant, like a cicisbeo of years gone by?
Before long he will be dust, and then it will be the turn of Don Gastone, and frati will give place to cicisbei.
Would-be cicisbeos, throwing out lures, had made haste to seek easier game after encountering one look from my Lord Spenborough.
As for Hero, the Viscount was not an ill-natured or an unreasonable young man, and he meant to make no objection to her forming her own court, with its attendant cicisbeos, and even (if discreetly conducted) its amorous intrigues.