girlish

girl +‎ -ish

• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈɡɚ.lɪʃ/
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈɡɜː.lɪʃ/

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• Rhymes: -ɜː(ɹ)lɪʃ

girlish (comparative more girlish, superlative most girlish)

1. Like (that of) a girl; feminine.
   • 1850, Nathaniel Hawthorne, chapter 2, in The Scarlet Letter, a Romance, Boston, Mass.: Ticknor, Reed, and Fields, OCLC 223202227:

     She saw her own face, glowing with girlish beauty, and illuminating all the interior of the dusky mirror in which she had been wont to gaze at it.

   • 1885, W. S. Gilbert, The Mikado, Act I,

     Three little maids from school are we, / Pert as a school-girl well can be, / Filled to the brim with girlish glee, / Three little maids from school!

   • 1898, William Watson, "Song" in The Hope of the World and Other Poems, London: John Lane, p. 41,

     April, April, / Laugh thy girlish laughter; / Then, the moment after, / Weep thy girlish tears!

2. (archaic) Of or relating to girlhood.
   • 1602, Richard Carew, The Survey of Cornwall, London: E. Law, 1769, pp. 119-20,

     This village was the birth-place of Thomasine Bonauenture, I know not, whether by descent, or euent, so called: for whiles in her girlish age she kept sheepe on the foreremembered moore, it chanced that a London merchant passing by, saw her […] .

• girlishly
• girlishness
• ungirlish

• schoolgirlish

• boyish
• womanish