virginal

From Middle French virginal, from Latin virginālis. The musical instrument is probably so called from being played by young girls.

virginal (comparative more virginal, superlative most virginal)

1. Being or resembling a virgin.
2. Uncontaminated or pure.
3. (zoology) parthenogenetic

Virginal (instrument)

virginal (plural virginal or virginals)

1. (music) A musical instrument in the harpsichord family.
   • 1932, Maurice Baring, chapter 16, in Friday's Business‎:

     His uncle, a Cardinal, engages a Spanish youth of Moorish descent called Diego, an expert singer and player on the virginal, to unlock the secrets of the heart, and to cleanse his bosom of the perilous stuff, and cure him by the spell of his music.

• rivaling

• IPA^(key): /viʁ.ʒi.nal/

virginal (feminine singular virginale, masculine plural virginaux, feminine plural virginales)

1. virginal

virginal m (plural virginaux)

1. virginal

• “virginal” in le Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

virginal m or f (plural virginais, comparable)

1. virginal (relating to virgins)
2. virgin: immaculate; chaste; untouched

For quotations of use of this term, see Citations:virginal.

• (immaculate): virgem, casto, imaculado

• virgem
• virgindade

virginal (plural virginales)

1. virginal