Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Troublesomely urgent or persistent in requesting; pressingly entreating: an importunate job seeker.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- Troublesomely solicitous or pressing; vexatiously persistent; pertinacious.
- Troublesome; vexatious.
Wiktionary
- v. rare To importune, or to obtain by importunity.
- adj. Of a demand: persistent or pressing, often annoyingly so.
- adj. Of a person: given to importunate demands, selfishly or thoughtlessly demanding.
GNU Webster's 1913
- adj. Troublesomely urgent; unreasonably solicitous; overpressing in request or demand; urgent; teasing.
- adj. rare Hard to be borne; unendurable.
WordNet 3.0
- adj. expressing earnest entreaty
Etymologies
- From Latin importune + -ate (Wiktionary)
Examples
“But I explained, in my purest Tuscan, that I was not of the ordinary kind of importunate tourist.”
“The word "importunate" has the signification of a wearisome repetition of a request, a constant asking, impossible to satisfy.”
“importunate' in asking again for my two Sophocles Abstracts, you must know that such importunity cannot but be grateful.”
“So much of success is pure dumb luck and/or being super-hot and/or having an importunate sister, as you have so eloquently described here.”
“These dreary folk, echoes of the dead past and importunate and self-elected pall-bearers for the present and future, proxy-livers of life and vicarious sensualists that they are in a eunuch sort of way, insist, since their own selves, environments, and narrow agitations of the quick are mediocre and commonplace, that no man or woman can rise above the mediocre and commonplace.”
“Initially, Wordsworth was supposed to be transferring his importunate family to England, but instead he dodged all responsibility and transferred his idealized love to his sister, Dorothy, who alone of all his family still seemed to admire and adore him.”
“This time, however, it's Americans who're the importunate immigrants.”
The Guardian: The Karate Kid betrays America's fear of China
“Consistent doses of hip-hop have been replaced by methodical dances and importunate hooks that stay in your head long after you've turned the radio off.”
The Huffington Post: Timothy Cooper: Happy Birthday, Tupac Shakur
“I love this poor, sad country dearly but, as some importunate fellows might be eager to point out, our cuisine is not exactly one of our strong points.”
“And at the risk of seeming importunate, I daresay humble is a word seldom applied to you, my lord Rolande.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘importunate’.
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GRE Barrons Wordlist
A complete Barron's Wordlist for GRE preparation. Your online flashcard replacement.
abase, abash, abate, abbreviate, abdicate, aberrant, aberration, abet, abeyance, abhor, abject, abjure and 4087 more...
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Words from Blood Meridian
visage, affray, scullery, miasma, mirth, purlieu, tacit, benighted, wickiup, corral, amble, accoutre and 210 more...
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Dash's list
Words of interest.
cacogen, fricatrice, destrier, swoon, multiverse, haggard, entranced, entheogen, passionate, ascendant, conciliator, bandylegged and 34 more...
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Tuna
tuna, unfortunate, bluefin tuna, albacore, tunny, Fortuna, fortuna, tuna salad, yellowfin tuna, ahi, bigeye tuna, skipjack tuna and 51 more...
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jung
Epimethean, enantiodromia, pettifogger, captiousness, sophistry, abstruse, importunate, philautic, misautic, mneme, psychoasthenia
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Whatevah
Stuff that's not categorized yet, because I don't have a category for it, or (more likely) because I'm lazy.
importunate, hector, extirpate, cicatrice, dysgraphia, tarradiddle, tartuffe, tinctorial, swallow-pipe, stownlins, posse comitatus, insightful and 1 more...
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big book gre
abase, abbess, abbey, abbot, abdicate, abdomen, abdominal, abduction, abed, aberration, abet, abeyance and 6691 more...
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Good for Academics
Gahh!! Study!
supplant, usurp, finagle, winnow, draconian, abut, collude, swindle, objectify, incite, decadent, obstinate and 327 more...
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Just 'cause I like 'em, I
irenic, inimical, ignotism, infrangible, internecine, illumine, ingot, imposter, iconoclast, indefeasible, indefatigable, impingement and 184 more...
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Clarissa, Or, The History of a Young ...
These words are from Samuel Richardson's novel Clarissa, Or, The History of a Young Lady, 1747-48
adumbrate, virago, varlet, rencounter, akimbo, palliate, amanuensis, amok, equipage, cully, se'ennight, resentments and 560 more...
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Personal Vocabulary List
All my favourite words that I come across!
veritable, incongruence, rigamorole, letcherous, revolting, repulsive, reputrid, rapatious, forays, guise, placate, paradigm and 1162 more...
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Faves
nepenthe, cupidity, anodyne, obdurate, doleful, obsolescent, quale, piquant, velleity, inchoate, disport, facile and 366 more...
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The New Yorker
prejudice, ignominious, quintessence, disparity, vanguard, repudiated, eclectic, dredge, taxonomy, pugnacious, surreptitiously, pudgy and 113 more...
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azd's Words
adamantine, abatial, ablate, ablative, abrogate, accretive, acromegaly, acrostic, actinism, actinic, acuity, adduce and 968 more...
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ADW1
obdurate, obstinate, behest, injunction, enjoin, circumspect, ensconce, discursive, lugubrious, doleful, somber, ken and 2476 more...
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Zooey's list
cosmology, consummate, demiurge, paradisiacal, reconnaissance, intransigent, otiose, zeitgeist, coalesce, zeitgeber, absolve, abstruse and 105 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for importunate.
yarb ...how she now dreaded
each night the importunate mauve-capped swollen member.
- Peter Reading, Carte Postale, from Diplopic, 1983 Jun 30, 2008
dhuber "expressing earnest entreaty"
-an alliterative definition Nov 15, 2007