Double entendre
wording that is devised to be understood in two ways
A double entendre (plural double entendres) is a figure of speech or a particular way of wording that is devised to have a double meaning, one of which is typically obvious, and the other often conveys a message that would be too socially unacceptable, or offensive to state directly.
A double entendre may exploit puns or word play to convey the second meaning. Double entendres generally rely on multiple meanings of words, or different interpretations of the same primary meaning. They often exploit ambiguity and may be used to introduce it deliberately in a text. Sometimes a homophone can be used as a pun. When three or more meanings have been constructed, this is known as a "triple entendre", etc.
Etymology
According to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary and the Oxford English Dictionary, the expression comes from the rare and obsolete French expression, which literally meant "double meaning" and was used in the senses of "double understanding" or "ambiguity", but acquired its current suggestive twist in English after being first used in 1673 by John Dryden. The phrase has not been used in French for centuries and would be ungrammatical in modern French. No exact equivalent exists in French, whose similar expressions (mot/expression à) double entente and (mot/expression à) double sens do not have the suggestiveness of the English expression.
Structure
A person who is unfamiliar with the hidden or alternative meaning of a sentence may fail to detect its innuendos, aside from observing that others find it humorous for no apparent reason.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Double entendre” is wording that is devised to be understood in two ways. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Double, entendre and wording, not as a finished interpretation.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 9, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q2030511. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1673.
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This entry incorporates text from “Double entendre” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.