| Library / English Dictionary |
DIGNIFIED
| Pronunciation (US): |  | (GB): | |
I. (adjective)
Sense 1
Meaning:
Having or expressing dignity; especially formality or stateliness in bearing or appearance
Example:
the director of the school was a dignified white-haired gentleman
Classified under:
Similar:
courtly; formal; stately (refined or imposing in manner or appearance; befitting a royal court)
distinguished; grand; imposing; magisterial (used of a person's appearance or behavior; befitting an eminent person)
Also:
composed (serenely self-possessed and free from agitation especially in times of stress)
elegant (refined and tasteful in appearance or behavior or style)
Antonym:
undignified (lacking dignity)
Sense 2
Meaning:
Having or showing self-esteem
Synonyms:
dignified; self-respectful; self-respecting
Classified under:
Similar:
proud (feeling self-respect or pleasure in something by which you measure your self-worth; or being a reason for pride)
II. (verb)
Sense 1
Past simple / past participle of the verb dignify
Context examples:
It was with him, of so simple, yet so dignified a nature.
(Emma, by Jane Austen)
It has been dignified and liberal.
(Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen)
I took the hand she held out with a dignified, unbending air, and it was as calm in mine as if her breast had been at peace.
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
And yet, with all this, he can be courteous, dignified, and kindly upon occasion, and I have seen an impulsive good-heartedness in the man which has made me overlook faults which come mainly from his being placed in a position which no one upon this earth was ever less fitted to fill.
(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
Sir Walter had taken a very good house in Camden Place, a lofty dignified situation, such as becomes a man of consequence; and both he and Elizabeth were settled there, much to their satisfaction.
(Persuasion, by Jane Austen)
With the Judge’s sons, hunting and tramping, it had been a working partnership; with the Judge’s grandsons, a sort of pompous guardianship; and with the Judge himself, a stately and dignified friendship.
(The Call of the Wild, by Jack London)
The little airs he put on and the painful striving to assume the easy carriage of a man born to a dignified place in life would have been sickening had they not been ludicrous.
(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)
We have had some dramatic entrances and exits upon our small stage at Baker Street, but I cannot recollect anything more sudden and startling than the first appearance of Thorneycroft Huxtable, M.A., Ph.D., etc. His card, which seemed too small to carry the weight of his academic distinctions, preceded him by a few seconds, and then he entered himself—so large, so pompous, and so dignified that he was the very embodiment of self-possession and solidity.
(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
They set forward; and, with a grandeur of air, a dignified step, which caught the eye, but could not shake the doubts of the well-read Catherine, he led the way across the hall, through the common drawing-room and one useless antechamber, into a room magnificent both in size and furniture—the real drawing-room, used only with company of consequence.
(Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen)
In fact, he rather prided himself on his narrow escapes, and liked to thrill the girls with graphic accounts of his triumphs over wrathful tutors, dignified professors, and vanquished enemies.
(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)
