Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary · 1913

Quaint

Quaint , adjective

[Old English queint, queynte, coint, prudent, wise, cunning, pretty, odd, Old French cointe cultivated, amiable, agreeable, neat, from Latin cognitus known, past participle of cognoscere to know; con + noscere (for gnoscere) to know. See Know, and compare Acquaint, Cognition.]

1.
Prudent; wise; hence, crafty; artful; wily. [Obsolete]
Clerks be full subtle and full quaint. — Chaucer
2.
Characterized by ingenuity or art; finely fashioned; skillfully wrought; elegant; graceful; nice; neat. [Archaic]
The queynte ring. — Chaucer
His queynte spear. — Chapman
A shepherd young quaint.
Every look was coy and wondrous quaint. — Spenser
To show bow quaint an orator you are. — Shakespeare
3.
Curious and fanciful; affected; odd; whimsical; antique; archaic; singular; unusual; as, quaint architecture; a quaint expression.
Some stroke of quaint yet simple pleasantry. — Macaulay
An old, long-faced, long-bodied servant in quaint livery. — W. Irving