Word.ws English Dictionary

platonic love

platonic love noun: intimate but non-sexual and non-romantic affection.

Noun (1)

platonic love (countable and uncountable, plural platonic loves)

  1. Intimate but non-sexual and non-romantic affection.

Noun (2) capitalized: Platonic love

Platonic love (countable and uncountable, plural Platonic loves)

  1. Alternative letter-case form of platonic love.
    • The practice of Platonic love, of which he had formed ſo fine an idea in ſpeculation, appeared to him but a chimera in reality.1773 April 12, “The Force of Honour”, in The Western Flying Post; or Sherborne and Yeovil Mercury and General Advertiser, volume XXV, number 2190, Sherborne, Dorset: […] R[obert] Goadby, […], →OCLC...
    • Ye ſanctified and holy, / Who methodiſtically prove / The force of true-⁠-⁠-Platonic love, / Indulge for once with Scholey.1775 February 18, “To the Printers of the Cambridge Chronicle”, in The Cambridge Chronicle and Journal, volume XIII, number 643, Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: […] T. Fletcher and F. Hodson, […], →OCLC...

Forms of platonic love

pluralplatonic loves
alternative formPlatonic love
pluralPlatonic loves

Origin of platonic love

Attested 1636 in Platonic Lovers by William Davenant. Earlier coined in Latin in the 15th century as amor platōnicus by Florentine scholar Marsilio Ficino (originally in 1476 letter to Alamanno Donati, later expounded in De amore (1484)), based on his interpretation of the Symposium by Plato, specifically the speech by Socrates, relating the thoughts of Diotima of Mantinea.

Questions about platonic love

What does platonic love mean?
Platonic love means intimate but non-sexual and non-romantic affection.
What part of speech is platonic love?
Platonic love is a noun.
What is the plural of platonic love?
The plural of platonic love is platonic loves.

Words near platonic love in the dictionary

  1. Platonic dialogues
  2. Platonic hydrocarbon
  3. Platonic hydrocarbons
  4. Platonic ideal
  5. Platonic ideals
  6. platonic love
  7. platonic loves
  8. Platonic month
  9. Platonic months
  10. Platonic solid
  11. Platonic solids

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: platonic love (page history and authors); Platonic love (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-platonic love.wav.

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