courtliness

Examples from literature

So I declined wine upon general principles when it was offered by the courtly host. 
There was a courtly, old-world sort of look about him. 
They were all looking at me now, and it seemed as though we had passed from courtly phrases, such as fall readily but with little import from a man's lips, and had come to a graver matter. 
With a courtly bow I left them. 
Yet Essex could be generous and knightly with his friends, kind and courtly, at least to his English dependents. 

Examples of courtly

courtly
The discernment and deployment of deception and indirection required in courtship prepared men for courtly existence as a whole.
The mind was the 'zone of engagement' for the dynamics of attachment and detachment which articulated the relations of courtly selves.
Courtesans sought to make their own way in courtly circles through the exercise of very real capacities amongst these affiliations.
The context of the courtly world, however, may be dimly discerned by attention to the dynamics of lovers themselves.
Only in three instances did a secondary figure show greater width than height; these were seated figures directly facing the primary figure in courtly scenes.
Women played a prominent role in courtly music-making.
Elite-courtly composition continued in private circles, though changing tastes among the elites made it into somewhat of a minority genre.
In his view, the group, courtly society, is present in this refrain not as participant but as addressee.
We are now in a position to examine the wine poem's logic of de-sublimation, which counters the logic of the courtly panegyric.
Illumination of differences might further define regional or courtly styles.
In the courtly world, self-restraint was a mark of freedom.
The musical repertoire used in the religious ceremonies has fared better than its courtly counterpart.
Courtly literature, then, needs to be read not as a mirroring but as mediating needs and tensions within courtly society.
Courtly poetry, however, must be put in the context of other types of sources.
One could speak, with the troubadours, of the invention of new traditions which would eventually formalise certain cultural ideals of the aristocracy and become what we call 'courtly love'.
See all examples of courtly
These examples are from corpora and from sources on the web. Any opinions in the examples do not represent the opinion of the Cambridge Dictionary editors or of Cambridge University Press or its licensors.