Louvre

Borrowed from French Louvre. More at Louvre Palace.

• IPA^(key): /ˈluːv(ɹə)/, /ˈluːvə(ɹ)/

• Audio (UK)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -uːvɹə, -uːvə(ɹ)

Louvre

1. A famous art museum and former royal palace in Paris, France.
   • 2011, Tara Kingston, Claimed by the Spymaster, page 68:

     God above, this man was as chiseled as the statues she'd spied in the Louvre.

   • 2010, Don McCauley, Power Trip: A Guide to Weightlifting for Coaches, Athletes and Parents, page 130:

     I don't care if your split, power or squat position looks like it should be in the Louvre, you won't jerk a thing.

   • 2006, Ted Nelson Lundrigan, Bob White, A Bird in the Hand, page 85:

     I preferred the Dutch apple pie, and my waitress for those few years had legs that belonged in the Louvre.

   • 1985 February, Phil Elderkin, “Don Mattingly: A.L. Batting Champion, A Born Hitter”, in Baseball Digest, volume 44, number 2, page 49:

     IF YOU ARE a young Joe DiMaggio or Mickey Mantle with a swing that belongs in the Louvre, somebody might get the idea you could win a batting title, even if it was only your second year with the New York Yankees.

   • 1960, Thomas Felix Staton, How to Instruct Successfully: Modern Teaching Methods in Adult Education, page 172:

     For purposes of illustrating a lecture on calisthenics, a stick figure is a better picture of a squatting man than something from the Louvre.

   • 1889, Alexandre Dumas, Dame de Monsoreau: Volume 1, page 319:

     They are cries which show that every one has his own place, and should stay in it, — M. de Guise in the streets, and you in the Louvre. Go to the Louvre, Sire; go to the Louvre.

• louver, velour

Of disputed origin:

• possibly from Latin Lupara, a name derived from lupus (“wolf”), as the first fortress of the Louvre was built on a place with such a name designating its area as a wolf hunting den.

• or of Germanic origin, such as Frankish; in an old Saxon-Latin gloss, Loëvar is translated as Castellum, related to Middle Low German lūren (“to watch over, lurk, spy”), from Proto-Germanic *lūraną, which is of uncertain origin, but possibly derived from Proto-Indo-European *lewk- (“to see, shine”).[1]

• possibly from Late Latin roboretum (“oak wood”), from Latin robur (“oak tree”), by analysis with the modern name of the Norman river Rouvre.[2]

• IPA^(key): /luvʁ/

• Audio

  (file)

Louvre m

1. Louvre