piquant.
Causing hurt feelings; scathing, severe.
Meaning & usage
Causing hurt feelings; scathing, severe.
Stimulating to the senses; engaging; charming.
Favorably stimulating to the palate; pleasantly spicy; tangy.
Producing a burning sensation due to the presence of chilies or similar spices; spicy, hot.
Where this word comes from
Borrowed from Middle French piquant (“pricking, stimulating, irritating”), present participle of piquer, possibly from Old French pikier (“to prick, sting, nettle”). Doublet of picong. Related to pike.
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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.
Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.