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souvenir

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary

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See also: Souvenir

English

Alternative forms

Etymology

An unadapted borrowing from French souvenir (literally “memory”); compare memento.

Pronunciation

Noun

souvenir (plural souvenirs)

  1. An item of sentimental value, that is given or kept to remember an event or location.
    Synonyms: keepsake, memento, memorabilia
    • 2005, “Souvenir”, performed by Korn:
      Back then, nobody knew in the schoolyard
      Now then, you have grown up to be this hard
      Go then, walk through this world with your heart scarred
      You're the souvenir of sadness
    • 2005, Steven Church, Guinness Book of Me, Simon and Schuster, →ISBN, page 138:
      The tourists stuck to the safe confines of the gift shop, where they bought souvenir combs, shot glasses, oversize pencils, and blocks of cedar painted with rhyming poems and shellacked to a high gloss.

Derived terms

Descendants

  • → Cantonese: souven

Translations

Verb

souvenir (third-person singular simple present souvenirs, present participle souveniring, simple past and past participle souvenired)

  1. (transitive) To take (something) as a souvenir, especially illicitly, for example during wartime.
    • 1979, Gustav Hasford, The Short-Timers, New York: Bantam Books, published 1980, →ISBN, page 57:
      "Doubletime up to the ville and souvenir me one cute orphan, man, but be sure you get a dirty one, a really skuzzy one."
    • 2017, Fiona Farrell, Decline and Fall on Savage Street, →ISBN, page 84:
      The word is they're waiting for some blokes who had gone off souveniring before the order was announced.
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Dutch

Etymology

Unadapted borrowing from French souvenir.

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /su.vəˈnir/
  • Audio:(file)
  • Hyphenation: sou‧ve‧nir

Noun

souvenir n (plural souvenirs, diminutive souvenirtje n)

  1. souvenir

Synonyms

Descendants

French

Etymology

Inherited from Middle French soubvenir, from Old French sovenir, from Latin subvenīre (“come to mind, occur to”), from sub + veniō. Doublet of subvenir.

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /su.v(ə).niʁ/
  • Audio; “se souvenir”:(file)
  • Audio (France (Vosges)):(file)
  • Audio (France (Lyon)):(file)
  • Hyphenation: sou‧ve‧nir

Verb

souvenir

  1. (pronominal) to remember [with de ‘someone/something’; or with que (+ clause) ‘that ...’]
    Synonym: rappeler
    il faut se souvenir que... ― It's necessary to remember that...
    Je me souviens de toi. ― I remember you.
    Est-ce que vous vous souvenez de ce que vous m'avez dit la semaine dernière ?
    Do you remember what you told me last week?

Conjugation

This is a verb in a group of -ir verbs. All verbs ending in -venir, such as convenir and devenir, are conjugated this way. Such verbs are the only verbs whose the past historic and subjunctive imperfect endings do not start in one of these thematic vowels (-a-, -i-, -u-).

Conjugation of se souvenir (see also Appendix:French verbs)
More information infinitive, simple ...

Derived terms

Noun

souvenir m (plural souvenirs)

  1. memory (mental picture)
    Je n'ai pas le souvenir de t'avoir dit ça…
    I don't remember telling you that…
    (literally, “I don't have the memory of me having told you that…”)
  2. souvenir
    J'ai ramené un souvenir de Paris.
    I have brought back a souvenir of Paris.

Derived terms

Descendants

Further reading

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Indonesian

Noun

souvênir (plural souvenir-souvenir)

  1. nonstandard form of suvenir

Italian

Old French

Spanish

Swedish

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