prettifyv.

1661 in Wit & Drollery (rev. ed.) 187 The French-man..prettifies us with Feathers and Fans.

1850 F. Trollope in F. E. Trollope Life (1895) II. xi. 203 Keep your money to prettify your house, dear son.

1867 G. Du Maurier Let. in D. Du Maurier Young George du Maurier (1951) 273 Then D and I walked through the lovely Bois de Boulogne to the Mare d'Auteuil which has been brutally modernised and prettyfied.

1890 Universal Rev. 15 June 181 He has prettified his market town, and thereby lost much of its reality.

1934 Sun (Baltimore) 2 Apr. 8/1 These endeavors [to outlaw certain forms of warfare] are based on the assumption that we are making progress if somehow we can manage to prettify war.

1970 Daily Tel. 21 Feb. 8/5 The 19th-century weakness for prettifying the lives of great men.

2003 D. Gaines Misfit's Manifesto ix. 174 New Wave had prettified and mainstreamed punk.

1855 Spectator 8 Dec. 1283/2 The title is a prettified affectation.

1919 B. Tarkington Let. 14 June in On Plays (1959) 13 You know..why all the magazines haf to have the prettified girl cover.

1995 Atlantic Monthly Aug. 13/3 Shelden must travel a far piece to reach the conclusion that I champion half-truths or prettified biographical portraits.

1910 Oakland (Calif.) Tribune 13 Nov. 32/4 (advt.) These window prettifiers will help amazingly.

2003 Independent on Sunday 13 July 2/2 They've been taken from some beach, and even the most urbanised backyard prettifier must see that they are therefore out of place.

1873 Scribner's Monthly Feb. 499/1 This sentimental prettifying of such a dull matter is not tolerable.

1992 New Republic 6 Apr. 26/3 Stone didn't mention whether the prettifying had anything to do with a need to please Kevin Costner.