pretty facen.
/ˌprɪtɪ ˈfeɪs/, U.S. /ˈˌprɪdi ˈˌfeɪs/ 1.
a. A person with a pretty face. Also as a term of endearment. Now rare, except in sense 1b.
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the world > life > the body > external parts of body > head > face > types of face > [noun] > person having
good face1591
chitty-face1601
dogfacea1627
Lenten chapsa1640
pretty face1675
baby face1726
slape-face1847
pinch-face1911
pizza face1964
zit-face1974
1675 C. Cotton tr. Lucian Judgm. of Paris in Burlesque upon Burlesque 147 What Ladies are these pretty faces, Thou lead'st into these desert places?
1740 S. Richardson Pamela (1824) I. xviii. 29 She hugged me to her, and said,..Prettyface, where gottest thou all thy knowledge?
1857 A. Trollope Barchester Towers I. xv. 235 Any man who is willing to sacrifice his interest to get possession of a pretty face is a fool.
1956 Kerrville (Texas) Times 29 June 1/1 Kerrville has a new WU operator, a prettyface from San Benito labeled Maxine McGinnis, a 20-year-old brownette.
1991 G. Malanga Three Diamonds 172 I never met a ‘pretty face’ Who wasn't trouble.
b. to be just a pretty face and variants: to have no qualities other than attractiveness, esp. with connotations of low intelligence; usually in negative contexts. Also: to be more than (just) a pretty face: to have qualities other than mere attractiveness, esp. intelligence.Often without the implication that the person referred to is particularly attractive.
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1873 Harper's Mag. July 253/2 I have heard that she is a pretty face, and nothing more.
1958 Times 30 May 8/6 (headline) ‘Primrose’ wins again at the Bath and West. ‘Not just a pretty face’.
1982 S. Paretsky Indemnity Only ii. 26 Was he just another pretty face, or did he know anything?
1997 C. Reid Plays: One ii. i. 338 She's not just a pretty face, you know. She's the star of the show on the openin' night.
2002 Time 25 Nov. 52/2 Edwards last week gave a well-received economic address, part of the North Carolina Senator's effort to prove he is more than a pretty face.
2. More fully pretty-face kangaroo, pretty-face wallaby. The whiptail wallaby, Macropus parryi, of eastern Australia, which is pale and slender with white and blackish stripes on the face and ears.
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the world > animals > mammals > group Implacenta > subclass Marsupialia (marsupials) > [noun] > family Macropodidae > wallaby > wallabies of genus Macropus
Parmac1842
toolache1879
pretty-face wallaby1887
scrub wallaby1896
1887 W. S. S. Tyrwhitt New Chum in Queensland Bush viii. 145 The smaller kind [of kangaroo], known as pretty faces or whip tails,..are rather smaller and of a grey colour.
1911 W. H. D. Le Souëf Wild Life Austral. vii. 215 The most graceful of the Kangaroos..are locally called Pretty-face or Whip-tailed Kangaroos.
1956 T. Y. Harris Naturecraft in Austral. 77 The Pretty-face Wallaby..grazes quietly in open country, usually in the cooler parts of the day.
2001 Courier-Mail (Brisbane) (Nexis) 21 Sept. d4 Pretty-face wallabies are on view for the first time in an open walk through an enclosure at the zoo.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, March 2007; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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