prim

Meanings

1. Of a person, their manner or appearance: Formal and precise; stiffly decorous.
2. Of a person: Prudish; straight-laced.
3. Of things: Neat; trim.

1. To make one's expression prim.
2. To give a prim or demure expression to (one's face, mouth, or (rare) lips).
3. To dress (one) up affectedly or demurely.

1. A prim person.

1. privet

1. A surname.

Etymology

Of uncertain origin. In the verb sense, first appeared in Thomas D'Urfey's A Fool's Preferment in the year 1688. In the noun sense, first appeared in A New Dictionary of the Terms Ancient and Modern of the Canting Crew in the year 1699, meaning "prig." Now obsolete. In the adjective sense, first appeared in Sir Richard Steele's The Funeral in the year 1702, meaning "consciously or affectedly strict or precise; stiffly formal and respectable." Oxford English Dictionary proposed a relation with primp and prink. Chiefly Scottish and U.S.