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When Should You Use urbane?
City slickers and country folk have long debated whether life is better in town or in the wide-open spaces, and urbane is a term that springs from the throes of that debate. In its earliest English uses, urbane was synonymous with its close relative urban ("of, relating to, characteristic of, or constituting a city"). Both words come from the Latin adjective urbanus ("urban, urbane"), which in turn is derived from urbs, meaning "city." Urbane developed its modern sense denoting savoir faire from the belief (no doubt fostered by city dwellers) that living in the city made one more suave and polished than did leading a rural life.
Examples of urbane in a Sentence
Sam Knight, The New Yorker, 25 Mar. 2024
The twilight exhibition times were a truly urbane novelty.
—Emily Labarge, New York Times, 26 Mar. 2024
See all Example Sentences for urbane 
These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'urbane.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.
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Cite this Entry
“Urbane.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/urbane. Accessed 29 May. 2024.
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