English edit

Alternative forms edit

Etymology edit

Borrowed into Middle English from Old French trenchant, the present participle of trenchier (to cut).

Pronunciation edit

  • IPA(key): /ˈtɹɛnʃənt/
  • (file)

Adjective edit

trenchant (comparative more trenchant, superlative most trenchant)

  1. (obsolete) Fitted to trench or cut; gutting; sharp.
    • 1663, Samuel Butler, Hudibras, part 1, canto 1:
      The trenchant blade, Toledo trusty, / For want of fighting was grown rusty, / And ate into itself, for lack / Of somebody to hew and hack.
    1. (zoology, of teeth) Adapted for tearing into flesh.
      • 1971, Thomas H. V. Rich, Deltatheridia, Carnivora, and Condylarthra (Mammalia) of the Early Eocene, Paris Basin, France:
        The trenchant talonid is a character of some miacids and distinguishes these teeth from the hyaenodontids and oxyaenids.
  2. (figuratively) Keen; biting; vigorously articulate and effective; severe.
    trenchant wit
    • 1899 February, Joseph Conrad, “The Heart of Darkness”, in Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine, volume CLXV, number M, New York, N.Y.: The Leonard Scott Publishing Company, [], →OCLC, part I, pages 210–211:
      His eyes, of the usual blue, were perhaps remarkably cold, and he certainly could make his glance fall on one as trenchant and heavy as an axe.
    • 2011, Jay A. Gertzman, Bookleggers and Smuthounds: The Trade in Erotica, 1920-1940:
      His trenchant criticisms of the Church's repression [] include a discussion of the considerable 1938 success of the fledgling NODL in getting magazines removed from various points of sale.

Translations edit

Middle French edit

Etymology edit

Old French trenchant.

Noun edit

trenchant m or f (plural trenchans)

  1. sharp

Descendants edit

  • French: tranchant

Old French edit

Adjective edit

trenchant m (oblique and nominative feminine singular trenchant or trenchante)

  1. sharp; razor sharp

Declension edit

Verb edit

trenchant

  1. present participle of trenchier