frump
/fɹʌmp/noun, verb
frump is a noun meaning “A frumpy person, somebody who is unattractive, drab or dowdy” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled F-R-U-M-P and has one syllable, and it appears about once in every 19 million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data). The plural of frump is frumps.
What does frump mean?
noun
- 1
colloquialA frumpy person, somebody who is unattractive, drab or dowdy.
You look like such a frump today!
- 2
colloquialUnattractive, dowdy clothes.
Get that frump off – it's horrid!
- 3
datedA bad-tempered person.
- 4
obsoleteA flout or snub.
verb
- 1
obsoleteTo insult; to flout; to mock; to snub.
- 2
To assume a countenance or demeanor indicating irritation, ill-humor, or disapproval.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How do you pronounce frump?
- /fɹʌmp/
Frump has one syllable (counted from its American pronunciation in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: LL-Q1860_(eng)-Vealhurl-frump.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Forms of frump
- frumps plural, present, singular, he/she/it
- frumping participle, present
- frumped participle, past
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How common is frump?
Frump appears about once in every 19 million words in written English, the 131,834th most frequent word form in the list.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
Where does frump come from?
Probably a contraction of late Middle English frumpylle (“wrinkle”), from Middle Dutch verrompelen, originally equivalent to for- + rump + -le.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).