1. 1

    Virginal is an adjective. Its plain meaning is "like a virgin" — belonging to, or suited to, someone who has never had sex. But that plain meaning is not really how the word earns its living. In modern English, virginal is mostly used to describe a *look* or a *feeling*: pure, untouched, innocent, sometimes innocent in a way that seems a bit unreal. A virginal white dress, a virginal expression, virginal snow on a mountain nobody has climbed. So it stretches easily to things that have nothing to do with sex at all: land no one has farmed, a beach with no footprints, a brand-new notebook. The idea it carries is "no one has touched this yet." The tone is important. It is a literary, slightly old-fashioned word. When a writer uses it about a person, it often carries a small sting — it can suggest someone is being innocent, or that the innocence is a performance. So it is not simply a compliment, and it is not a neutral clinical word either. If you want the neutral fact about a person, English says "she is a virgin," not "she is virginal." You will also meet virginal as a noun, meaning the old keyboard instrument (see virginals). Same spelling, different job in the sentence.

    處女般的、純潔未經世事的;(引申)未經觸碰的、原封不動的

    例句逐字對照、搭配詞、易混淆字

    這一義的完整解析還沒打開。訂閱後可以看到例句怎麼拆、常跟哪些字一起出現, 以及容易跟它搞混的字。

    看看訂閱內容

組成virgin (a person who has not had sex) + -al (the ending that turns a noun into an adjective: nature → natural, music → musical). English took it through Middle English virginal from Middle French virginal, from Latin virginālis. The musical instrument is probably called this because young girls were the ones who usually played it.

同家族的字

  • virginthe base word — virginal is simply its adjective form
  • virginitysame Latin root virgo/virgin-, plus the noun ending -ity

原始詞典資料4 筆記錄

以下是外部詞典記錄的用法,原文照列,我們還沒有寫成教學內容。上面的說明才是我們自己寫的;有些用法可能上面已經講過了。

virginaladj/ˈvɜː(ɹ)d͡ʒɪnəl/

  • 1

    Being or resembling a virgin.

  • 2

    Uncontaminated or pure.

  • 3

    biologynatural-scienceszoologyParthenogenic.

virginalnoun/ˈvɜː(ɹ)d͡ʒɪnəl/

  • 1

    entertainmentlifestylemusicA musical instrument in the harpsichord family.

    • His uncle, a Cardinal, engages a Spanish youth of Moorish descent called Diego, an expert singer and player on the virginal, to unlock the secrets of the heart, and to cleanse his bosom of the perilous stuff, and cure him by the spell of his music.

資料來源:英文維基詞典 English WiktionaryCC BY-SA 4.0)。 原文照列,未經改寫。