• (America) IPA: /ˈkɑmpləmənt/
• (RP) IPA: /ˈkɒmplɪmənt/

compliment (plural compliments)

1. An expression of praise, congratulation, or respect.
   • c. 1610, William Shakespeare, The Winter's Tale, Act I, Scene 2,

     […] I met him

     With customary compliment; when he,

     Wafting his eyes to the contrary and falling

     A lip of much contempt, speeds from me and

     So leaves me to consider what is breeding

     That changeth thus his manners.

   • 1671, John Milton, Paradise Regained, London: T. Longman et al., 1796, Book 4, p. 65,

     [...] what honour that,

     but tedious waste of time, to sit and hear

     So many hollow compliments and lies,

     Outlandish flatteries?

   • 1782, William Cowper, “Table Talk” in Poems, London: J. Johnson, p. 37,

     Virtue indeed meets many a rhiming friend,

     And many a compliment politely penn’d,

2. (uncountable) Complimentary language; courtesy, flattery.
   • 1743, Robert Drury (sailor), The Pleasant, and Surprizing Adventures of Mr. Robert Drury, during his Fifteen Years Captivity on the Island of Madagascar, London, p. 25,

     He told the Captain, He was heartily sorry for his Misfortunes; tho’ in my Opinion that was nothing but a Compliment: For, as I found afterwards, he was more brutish, and dishonest, than most of the other Kings on the Island […]

   • 1871, George Eliot [pseudonym; Mary Ann Evans], chapter III, in Middlemarch: A Study of Provincial Life, volume I, Edinburgh; London: William Blackwood and Sons, OCLC 948783829 ↗, book I (Miss Brooke), page 48 ↗:

     This accomplished man condescended to think of a young girl, and take the pains to talk to her, not with absurd compliment, but with an appeal to her understanding, and sometimes with instructive correction.

3. Misspelling of complement

• See Thesaurus:praise

• insult

• French: compliment
• German: Kompliment, Lob, Anerkennung, Achtungsbezeugung, Ehrenbezeigung
• Italian: complimento
• Portuguese: elogio
• Russian: комплиме́нт
• Spanish: cumplido

• German: Kompliment, Schmeichelei, Höflichkeitsbezeigung, Höflichkeitsbezeugung

compliment (compliments, present participle complimenting; past and past participle complimented)

1. (ambitransitive) To pay a compliment (to); to express a favorable opinion (of).

   • Monarchs should their inward soul disguise; […] / Should compliment their foes and shun their friends.

2. Misspelling of complement

• insult

• French: complimenter, faire un compliment, faire des compliments
• German: beglückwünschen, ein Kompliment machen, loben, komplimentieren
• Italian: complimentarsi
• Portuguese: elogiar
• Russian: говори́ть комплимент
• Spanish: felicitar, cumplimentar