Word.ws English Dictionary

chapeau

/ʃæˈpəʊ/US/ʃæˈpoʊ/

chapeau noun: a hat.

chapeau: a hat
Image: Arthur Charles Fox-Davies, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun

chapeau (plural chapeaus or chapeaux)

  1. A hat.
  2. A cap of maintenance.
  3. The mass of grape solids that floats on the surface during the fermentation of wine.
  4. The text at the start of a numbered section of a legal document that appears directly beside the section number, ahead of any numbered subsections.
  5. (international law) A passage of introductory text appearing in a treaty that broadly defines its principles, objectives, and background.

Interjection

  1. well done, bravo; a verbal representation of a hat tip
    • Chapeau to you for the presence of mind.2012, Kfir Luzzatto, The Evelyn Project, PINE TEN, LLC, →ISBN
    • I fully understand the mother's concerns; and I say chapeau to her twice. The first for allowing her daughter the opportunity to study abroad, and secondly for accompanying her during the first months of study to ease her homelessness.2017, Jamal AlShehhi, Uncle Sam & Myself: Living in the land of Uncle Sam, Kuttab Publishing, →ISBN, page 38

Forms of chapeau

pluralchapeaus
pluralchapeaux

Origin of chapeau

Borrowed from Middle French chappeau. The interjection is after Modern French chapeau in similar use, originally short for chapeau bas.

Words formed from chapeau

Words that rhyme with chapeau

48 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about chapeau

What does chapeau mean?
Chapeau means a hat.
What part of speech is chapeau?
Chapeau can be a noun or an interjection.
How do you pronounce chapeau?
Chapeau is pronounced /ʃæˈpəʊ/ (UK).
What is the plural of chapeau?
The plural of chapeau is chapeaus.

Words near chapeau in the dictionary

  1. Chapcha
  2. chapchae
  3. Chapdelaine
  4. Chapdelaines
  5. chape
  6. chapeau
  7. chapeau-bras
  8. chapeaued
  9. chapeaugraphy
  10. chapeaus
  11. chapeaux

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: chapeau (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-chapeau.wav.

Cite this entry: “chapeau.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/chapeau. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.