extreme delicacy or subtlety in action, performance, skill, discrimination, taste, etc.
skill in handling a difficult or highly sensitive situation; adroit and artful management: exceptional diplomatic finesse.
a trick, artifice, or stratagem.
Bridge, Whist. an attempt to win a trick with a card while holding a higher card not in sequence with it, in the hope that the card or cards between will not be played.
verb (used without object), fi·nessed, fi·ness·ing.
to use finesse or artifice.
to make a finesse at cards.
verb (used with object), fi·nessed, fi·ness·ing.
to bring about by finesse or artifice.
to make a finesse with (a card).
to force the playing of (a card) by a finesse.
1, 2. tact, diplomacy, savoir faire, circumspection, sensitivity, sensibility.
The best whiskies are made with finesse and the same attention to detail and mindfulness as the finest teas or sushi.
A lot of Republican candidates are trying to finesse the establishment-Tea Party Maginot Line and be both things to all people.
Whereas the first three seasons were subtle, there is a decided lack of finesse here.
Perhaps the language loses some finesse after being translated from Italian, by Jamie Richards.
The days when skill in ball placement and finesse could outgun power have long past.
From a saute de foie, what delicate subtleties of finesse might have their origin?
With French finesse he hits his mark 72 by expressly avoiding it.
Who but Turkey could discover the nests of hens whose maternal anxiety had eluded the finesse of Kirsty?
Thousands of Spaniards fell as the result of his daring and finesse in military execution.
And with all the finesse of their work the traffic moves like molasses.
1520s, from Middle French finesse "fineness, subtlety," from Old French fin "subtle, delicate" (see fine (adj.)).
1746, originally as a term in whist; see finesse (n.). Related: Finessed; finessing.