French letter
French letter noun: a condom.
Noun
French letter (plural French letters)
- A condom.
- ‘So you’re fifteen – and you know the function of a “French letter”? You are familiar with its use?’
‘I know what it’s for, sir, yes.’1984, Leslie Thomas, In my Wildest Dreams, page 289 - “I suppose it’s too much to hope that you have a question about gonorrhea. Those questions are so much easier to answer.”[…]
“I was going to ask about what you said earlier. That you’d... that you’d... not used a French letter in eighteen months.”2012, Courtney Milan, A Kiss for Midwinter, page 80
- Synonyms:
- condom, cum catcher, rubber
- ‘So you’re fifteen – and you know the function of a “French letter”? You are familiar with its use?’
Synonyms of French letter
Forms of French letter
| plural | French letters |
|---|
Origin of French letter
From French + letter. Compare earlier French pox, French-sick (“syphilis”), or later French safe, French tickler (“condom”), or French kiss. Attested from the 19th century.
Words formed from French letter
Questions about French letter
- What does French letter mean?
- French letter means a condom.
- What part of speech is French letter?
- French letter is a noun.
- What is the plural of French letter?
- The plural of French letter is French letters.
Words near French letter in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: French letter (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.
Last updated:
Cite this entry: “French letter.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/french_letter. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.