santon

Borrowed from French santon, from Spanish santón.

santon (plural santons)

1. A Muslim holy man.
   • 1818, John Keats, To J. H. Reynolds, Esq.:

     Part of the building was a chosen see, / Built by a banished santon of Chaldee [...].

2. In France (originally Provence), a small, hand-painted, terracotta figurine of a nativity character.
   • 1974, Lawrence Durrell, Monsieur, Faber & Faber, published 1992, page 49:

     Also we had brought a huge family of little santons of painted terracotta for the crêche.

• annots., nantos, non-TAS, sonant, stanno-

• IPA^(key): /sɑ̃.tɔ̃/

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santon m (plural santons)

1. santon

• “santon”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.