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Je ne sais quoi

2 stages from French to English.

Today it means a pleasant quality that is hard to describe or identify
1
Stage 1 of 2
je ne sais quoi
French · 1600s
"I don't know what"
literally I don't know what, describing an indefinable quality
2
Stage 2 of 2
je ne sais quoi
English · 1650s
"an indefinable, attractive quality"
adopted directly for a pleasant but hard-to-describe quality
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