"silver spoon" meaning in English

See silver spoon in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Noun

Audio: En-au-silver spoon.ogg
Etymology: Rooted in 18th century European table-setting customs, when diners would bring their own utensils to the meal. To distinguish themselves from serfs and peasants, members of the land-owning classes often used silver cutlery, whence the term silverware. Head templates: {{en-noun|-}} silver spoon (uncountable)
  1. (idiomatic) Wealth passed down or inherited. Tags: idiomatic, uncountable Related terms: born with a silver spoon in one's mouth, silvertail [Australian, English], silver fork novel Translations (wealth passed down): 金鎖匙 (Chinese Cantonese), 金锁匙 (gam¹ so² si⁴) (Chinese Cantonese), 金湯匙 (Chinese Mandarin), 金汤匙 (jīn tāngchí) (Chinese Mandarin), 金鑰匙 (Chinese Mandarin), 金钥匙 (jīnyàoshi) (Chinese Mandarin), hopealusikka (Finnish)
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  "etymology_text": "Rooted in 18th century European table-setting customs, when diners would bring their own utensils to the meal. To distinguish themselves from serfs and peasants, members of the land-owning classes often used silver cutlery, whence the term silverware.",
  "head_templates": [
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      "expansion": "silver spoon (uncountable)",
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  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "noun",
  "senses": [
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          "kind": "other",
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      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "text": "He was born with a silver spoon and an upturned nose. He didn't lose the latter when he squandered the former.",
          "type": "example"
        },
        {
          "ref": "1969, Creedence Clearwater Revival (lyrics and music), “Fortunate Son”, in Willy and the Poor Boys:",
          "text": "Some folks are born silver spoon in hand / Lord, don't they help themselves, yeah",
          "type": "quote"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "Wealth passed down or inherited."
      ],
      "id": "en-silver_spoon-en-noun-zmd8KGZj",
      "links": [
        [
          "Wealth",
          "wealth"
        ],
        [
          "inherited",
          "inherited"
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      "raw_glosses": [
        "(idiomatic) Wealth passed down or inherited."
      ],
      "related": [
        {
          "word": "born with a silver spoon in one's mouth"
        },
        {
          "tags": [
            "Australian",
            "English"
          ],
          "word": "silvertail"
        },
        {
          "word": "silver fork novel"
        }
      ],
      "tags": [
        "idiomatic",
        "uncountable"
      ],
      "translations": [
        {
          "code": "yue",
          "lang": "Chinese Cantonese",
          "sense": "wealth passed down",
          "word": "金鎖匙"
        },
        {
          "code": "yue",
          "lang": "Chinese Cantonese",
          "roman": "gam¹ so² si⁴",
          "sense": "wealth passed down",
          "word": "金锁匙"
        },
        {
          "code": "cmn",
          "lang": "Chinese Mandarin",
          "sense": "wealth passed down",
          "word": "金湯匙"
        },
        {
          "code": "cmn",
          "lang": "Chinese Mandarin",
          "roman": "jīn tāngchí",
          "sense": "wealth passed down",
          "word": "金汤匙"
        },
        {
          "code": "cmn",
          "lang": "Chinese Mandarin",
          "sense": "wealth passed down",
          "word": "金鑰匙"
        },
        {
          "code": "cmn",
          "lang": "Chinese Mandarin",
          "roman": "jīnyàoshi",
          "sense": "wealth passed down",
          "word": "金钥匙"
        },
        {
          "code": "fi",
          "lang": "Finnish",
          "sense": "wealth passed down",
          "word": "hopealusikka"
        }
      ]
    }
  ],
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  "word": "silver spoon"
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{
  "etymology_text": "Rooted in 18th century European table-setting customs, when diners would bring their own utensils to the meal. To distinguish themselves from serfs and peasants, members of the land-owning classes often used silver cutlery, whence the term silverware.",
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
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      "expansion": "silver spoon (uncountable)",
      "name": "en-noun"
    }
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  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "noun",
  "related": [
    {
      "word": "born with a silver spoon in one's mouth"
    },
    {
      "tags": [
        "Australian",
        "English"
      ],
      "word": "silvertail"
    },
    {
      "word": "silver fork novel"
    }
  ],
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        "Pages with entries",
        "Terms with Cantonese translations",
        "Terms with Finnish translations",
        "Terms with Mandarin translations"
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "text": "He was born with a silver spoon and an upturned nose. He didn't lose the latter when he squandered the former.",
          "type": "example"
        },
        {
          "ref": "1969, Creedence Clearwater Revival (lyrics and music), “Fortunate Son”, in Willy and the Poor Boys:",
          "text": "Some folks are born silver spoon in hand / Lord, don't they help themselves, yeah",
          "type": "quote"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "Wealth passed down or inherited."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "Wealth",
          "wealth"
        ],
        [
          "inherited",
          "inherited"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(idiomatic) Wealth passed down or inherited."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "idiomatic",
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      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2b/En-au-silver_spoon.ogg"
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  "translations": [
    {
      "code": "yue",
      "lang": "Chinese Cantonese",
      "sense": "wealth passed down",
      "word": "金鎖匙"
    },
    {
      "code": "yue",
      "lang": "Chinese Cantonese",
      "roman": "gam¹ so² si⁴",
      "sense": "wealth passed down",
      "word": "金锁匙"
    },
    {
      "code": "cmn",
      "lang": "Chinese Mandarin",
      "sense": "wealth passed down",
      "word": "金湯匙"
    },
    {
      "code": "cmn",
      "lang": "Chinese Mandarin",
      "roman": "jīn tāngchí",
      "sense": "wealth passed down",
      "word": "金汤匙"
    },
    {
      "code": "cmn",
      "lang": "Chinese Mandarin",
      "sense": "wealth passed down",
      "word": "金鑰匙"
    },
    {
      "code": "cmn",
      "lang": "Chinese Mandarin",
      "roman": "jīnyàoshi",
      "sense": "wealth passed down",
      "word": "金钥匙"
    },
    {
      "code": "fi",
      "lang": "Finnish",
      "sense": "wealth passed down",
      "word": "hopealusikka"
    }
  ],
  "word": "silver spoon"
}

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This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-11-06 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-10-02 using wiktextract (fbeafe8 and 7f03c9b). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.