Word.ws English Dictionary

odalisque

UK/ˈəʊd(ə)lɪsk/US/ˈoʊdlɪsk/

odalisque noun: a female slave in a harem, especially one in the Ottoman seraglio.

odalisque: a female slave in a harem, especially one in the Ottoman seraglio
Image: Jules Lefebvre, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun

odalisque (plural odalisques)

  1. (historical) A female slave in a harem, especially one in the Ottoman seraglio.
    • When the young Mauretanians were his guests in the little houses before the town gates, and he was of a good humour, it would come about that he displayed his odalisques as others would their jewels.1947 [1939], Ernst Jünger, translated by Stuart Hood, On the Marble Cliffs, New Directions, translation of Auf den Marmorklippen (in German), →LCCN, →OCLC, page 12
    • They grew fat, but successfully resisted the enticing odalisques with whom they were confronted.1961, Harry E. Wedeck, Dictionary of Aphrodisiacs, New York: The Citadel Press, page 96
  2. An erotic painting of a woman, usually nude, reclining in a luxurious or exotic setting.
    • Three years later, she added three more odalisques to her collection. Among the works she purchased in 1937 was an ink study that gave her insight into one stage in the evolution of the 1928 painting.2016 May 19, K. Porter Aichele, Modern Art on Display: The Legacies of Six Collectors, Bloomsbury Publishing USA, →ISBN, page 153
  3. A desirable or sexually attractive woman.

odalisque meaning in Urdu and Arabic

odalisque in Urdu

باندی

odalisque in Arabic

a female harem slave
جَارِيَّة jāriyya

Examples of odalisque in a sentence

  • Though I could see the titan odalisques and their garden and knew them to be no more than dream-stuff recalled, I could not escape from their fascination and the memory of the dream.1981, Gene Wolfe, chapter VIII, in The Claw of the Conciliator (The Book of the New Sun; 2), New York: Timescape, →ISBN, page 72:
  • The Sector is borne in a padded Waggon, like some mechanickal Odalisque.1997, Thomas Pynchon, chapter 30, in Mason & Dixon, 1st US edition, New York: Henry Holt and Company, →ISBN, part Two: America, page 296:

Antonyms of odalisque

Forms of odalisque

pluralodalisques
alternative formodalisk

Origin of odalisque

Borrowed from French odalisque, from Ottoman Turkish اوطهلق (odalık, “chambermaid”), from اوده (oda, “room”).

Questions about odalisque

What does odalisque mean?
Odalisque means a female slave in a harem, especially one in the Ottoman seraglio.
What is odalisque in Urdu?
Odalisque in Urdu is باندی. See Odalisque meaning in Urdu.
How do you use odalisque in a sentence?
Though I could see the titan odalisques and their garden and knew them to be no more than dream-stuff recalled, I could not escape from their fascination and the memory of the dream.
What part of speech is odalisque?
Odalisque is a noun.
How do you pronounce odalisque?
Odalisque is pronounced /ˈəʊd(ə)lɪsk/ (UK).
What is the plural of odalisque?
The plural of odalisque is odalisques.

Words near odalisque in the dictionary

  1. odalique
  2. odaliques
  3. odalisk
  4. odalisks
  5. odalism
  6. odalisque
  7. odalisques
  8. odaller
  9. odallers
  10. odalman
  11. odalmen

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: odalisque (page history and authors); odalisque (Urdu Wiktionary) (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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Cite this entry: “odalisque.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/odalisque. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.