roughness

Definitions  ·  Examples  ·  Pronunciations  ·  Etymologies  ·  Related  ·  Statistics  ·  Comments  · 
“
Next time that feller has to be rescued, you let Bet Gallup do it She knew Cap'n Amazon well enough now to see that his roughness was assumed.

View all »
Definitions (11)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary

Toggle Century definitions Century Dictionary (3)

  1. The state or property of being rough, in any sense of that word; physical, mental, or moral want of smoothness or equability; asperity, coarseness, harshness, rudeness, etc. This is some fellow Who, having been praised for bluntness, doth affect A saucy roughness. Shak., Lear, ii. 2. 103. Divers plants contain a grateful sharpness, as lemons; or an austere and inconcocted roughness, as sloes. Sir T. Browne. The roughness of a surface, as that of a piece of undressed stone, may be recognized to some extent by merely laying the outspread hand on the surface. J. Sully, Outlines of Psychol., p. 168.
  2. Fodder for animals, consisting of dried cornstalks cut into short pieces. [Southern and western U. S.] She slipped off her horse, pulled the saddle from him, and threw it inside the door, then turned the animal loose. “Ef he gits ter thur roughness, I shan't blame him noan,” she remarked. On a North Carolina Mountain, N. Y. Tribune, Oct. 28, 1888.
  3. Synonyms See rough.

Toggle GNU Webster definitions GNU Webster's 1913 (1)

Toggle WordNet definitions WordNet (7)

Toggle elsewhere links Elsewhere on the web

View all »
Examples (50)

  • His hand found roughness, and he looked down from the heights for the first time. —  Analog July, 1974
  • In the school there was an almost brutal element of roughness, and fights were frequent; not only in our own, but between ours and neighbouring schools. —  Fifty Years of Railway Life in England, Scotland and Ireland
  • Neutrogena Norwegian Formula® Age Shield Hand Cream improves what ages the look of hands most - roughness, age spots and fine lines. —  eBeautyDaily
  • But the roughness, the realism, the dirty, raw, emotional, amazing scenes just explode quietly one after the other. —  Caged Bird Sings
  • You know that deliberate pushing, striking or any kind of roughness is forbidden, and you could be disqualified as a player. —  Marjorie Dean, High School Freshman
More examples »
 

Tags

roughness hasn't been tagged yet.

Sign up or sign in to add tags.

Stats

This word has been looked up 39 times.

stop updating
On Twitter

Photos from

flickr images

Add a related word »
Related

Roget's II Roget's II: The New Thesaurus

Allen's Allen's Synonyms and Antonyms

Used in the same context Used in the Same Context

harshness ·  rudeness ·  hardness ·  frankness ·  coarseness ·  crudity ·  softness ·  coldness ·  sternness ·  fineness ·  brutality ·  ferocity
Roget's II: The New Thesaurus, Third Edition by the Editors of the American Heritage® Dictionary. Copyright © 2003, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Etymologies (1)

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (1)

  1. from Middle English *roughnes, rownes; from rough + -ness.
 

Pronunciations
Record your own »

If you'd like to prod us on getting a pronunciation for this word, sign in (or sign up) and let us know.

Charts
frequency chart

Bubble size: how much this word was used in a year

Bubble height: used more or less than expected, vs. all uses evenly distributed

You can expect to see this word about twice a month.

Recently looked up

good-morrow · desaturation · saturated · zestful · sand-dune

Recent Favorites

pygopagus · sanglant · Astacus · sweetbread · qualms

Recent Pronunciations

qualms · poofter · oh for heaven's sake · embodies · silence