Word.ws English Dictionary

musette

Syllables: mus·ette/mjuːˈzɛt/US/mjuˈzɛt/

musette noun: any of various small bagpipes having a soft sound, especially with a bellows, which were popular in France in the 17th and early 18th century.

musette: An ornate accordion with mother of pearl keys and colorful floral enamel patterns
Photo by The Metropolitan Museum of Art on Unsplash

Noun

musette (plural musettes)

  1. (historical) Any of various small bagpipes having a soft sound, especially with a bellows, which were popular in France in the 17th and early 18th century.
    Synonyms:
    pastoral oboe, shepherd's pipe
    1. (broadly, historical) A pastoral air or tune that has a drone imitating such an instrument; also, a dance performed to this music.
  2. (historical) An organ stop using reed pipes with cone-shaped resonators, found in organs in France in the 17th and 18th centuries.
  3. A small oboe without a cap for its reed, which evolved from the chanter or pipe of bagpipes; a piccolo oboe.
    Synonyms:
    oboe musette, piccoloboe
  4. (US) In full musette bag: a small bag or knapsack with a shoulder strap, formerly used by soldiers, and now (cycling) chiefly by cyclists to hold food and beverages or other items.
    • The young gentleman had a musette over his shoulder.1923, [Ernest Hemingway], “Out of Season”, in Three Stories […] & Ten Poems […], [Paris]: [Contact Publishing Company]; printed at Dijon by Maurice Darantière, →OCLC, page 13
    • I gave them money for platform tickets and had them take my baggage. There was a big rucksack and two musettes.1929 May–October, Ernest Hemingway, chapter 23, in A Farewell to Arms, 1st British edition, London: Jonathan Cape […], published 1929, →OCLC, book II, page 156

Synonyms of musette

Forms of musette

pluralmusettes

Origin of musette

From both of the following: * Late Middle English musette (“type of bagpipe”), from Middle French musette, Old French musette (“type of bagpipe”) (modern French musette), from muse (“bagpipe”) + -ette (diminutive suffix). Muse is derived from muser (“to play the bagpipe; (figuratively) to flatter”), perhaps from musel (“muzzle (protruding part of an animal’s head)”) (alluding to a bagpipe player puffing out the cheeks), from Late Latin mūsus (“muzzle”); further etymology uncertain, perhaps expressive of protruding lips and/or influenced by Latin mūgiō (“to bellow, low, moo”), from Proto-Indo-European *mug-, *mūg- (onomatopoeia of the lowing of cattle). * Borrowed from French musette in the 18th century. Sense 2 (“small bag or knapsack with a shoulder strap”) is due to the resemblance of the original knapsack to the bag of bagpipes.

Words that rhyme with musette

48 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about musette

What does musette mean?
Musette means any of various small bagpipes having a soft sound, especially with a bellows, which were popular in France in the 17th and early 18th century.
What part of speech is musette?
Musette is a noun.
How do you pronounce musette?
Musette is pronounced /mjuːˈzɛt/ (UK).
What is the plural of musette?
The plural of musette is musettes.

Words near musette in the dictionary

  1. muses
  2. musest
  3. muset
  4. museth
  5. musets
  6. musette
  7. musettes
  8. musetto
  9. museum
  10. museum beetle
  11. museum beetles

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: musette (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:

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

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