Meaning of MERETRICIOUS
| Pronunciation: | | `meri'treeshus
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 WordNet Dictionary |
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- [adj] based on pretense; deceptively pleasing; "the gilded and perfumed but inwardly rotten nobility"; "meretricious praise"; "a meretricious argument"
- [adj] tastelessly showy; "a flash car"; "a flashy ring"; "garish colors"; "a gaudy costume"; "loud sport shirts"; "a meretricious yet stylish book"; "tawdry ornaments"
- [adj] (archaic) like or relating to a prostitute; "meretricious relationships"
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| | Synonyms: | | brassy, cheap, flash, flashy, garish, gaudy, gilded, gimcrack, in poor taste(p), insincere, loud, specious, tacky, tasteless, tatty, tawdry, trashy |
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| Webster's 1913 Dictionary |
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| | Definition: | | \Mer`e*tri"cious\, a. [L. meretricius, from
meretrix, -icis, a prostitute, lit., one who earns money, i.
e., by prostitution, fr. merere to earn, gain. See {Merit}.]
1. Of or pertaining to prostitutes; having to do with
harlots; lustful; as, meretricious traffic.
2. Resembling the arts of a harlot; alluring by false show;
gaudily and deceitfully ornamental; tawdry; as,
meretricious dress or ornaments. -- {Mer`e*tri"cious*ly},
adv. -- {Mer`e*tri"cious*ness}, n.
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| Thesaurus Terms |
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| | Related Terms: | | affected, apparent, bedizened, beggarly, beneath contempt, big-sounding, blatant, brazen, brazenfaced, cheap, cheesy, chintzy, coarse, colorable, colored, colorful, common, contemptible, convoluted, crass, crude, crummy, deceptive, declamatory, delusive, delusory, despicable, earthy, elevated, euphuistic, extravagant, fallen, flagrant, flamboyant, flaming, flaring, flashy, flaunting, fulsome, garish, gaudy, gilded, gimcracky, glaring, Gongoresque, gorgeous, grandiloquent, grandiose, grandisonant, gross, harlot, highfalutin, high-flowing, high-flown, high-flying, high-sounding, hustling, inkhorn, insincere, Johnsonian, labyrinthine, lexiphanic, lofty, loud, lurid, magniloquent, mean, miserable, misleading, obscene, obtrusive, on the, on the town, orotund, ostensible, ostentatious, overdone, overelaborate, overinvolved, overwrought, paltry, pathetic, pave, pedantic, pitiable, pitiful, plausible, pompous, poor, pretentious, prostitute, prostituted, raw, rhetorical, ribald, rough, rubbishy, rude, sad, scarlet, screaming, scrubby, scruffy, scummy, scurvy, scuzzy, seeming, sensational, sensationalistic, sententious, shabby, shameless, shoddy, showy, sonorous, sorry, specious, spectacular, spurious, stilted, streetwalking, tall, tawdry, tinsel, tortuous, trashy, trumpery, two-for-a-cent, two-for-a-penny, twopenny, twopenny-halfpenny, valueless, vile, vulgar, whorish, worthless, wretched |
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