penchant

Definition

Taste, liking, or inclination (for).

Etymology

Unadapted borrowing from French penchant, present participle of pencher (“to tilt, to lean”), from Middle French, from Old French pengier (“to tilt, be out of line”), from Vulgar Latin *pendicāre, a derivative of Latin pendere (“to hang”).

Example Sentences

• "He has a penchant for fine wine."
• "Marie even then began the course which, in after-years, secured her so vast an influence in the court,—alternately taking up and laying down her claim to the youthful monarch's penchant; administering to his amusement, and ready to encourage his passing fancies."
• "THE LONDON & NORTH WESTERN RAILWAY. By O. S. Nock. Ian Allan. 30s. [...] One scarcely imagined, for example, that the great steel works at Crewe owed its existence to Sir Richard Moon's penchant for the principle of "Do it yourself", a principle born of a methodical, economical and far-seeing mind."