Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Filthy or dirty; foul.
- adj. Depressingly squalid; wretched: sordid shantytowns.
- adj. Morally degraded: "The sordid details of his orgies stank under his very nostrils” ( James Joyce). See Synonyms at mean2.
- adj. Exceedingly mercenary; grasping.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- Dirty; filthy; squalid; foul.
- In bot, and zoology, of a dull or dirty hue; impure; muddy: noting a color when it appears as if clouded by admixture with another, or parts so colored: as, sordid blue, etc.
- Morally foul; gross; base; vile; ignoble; selfish; miserly.
- Low; menial; groveling.
Wiktionary
GNU Webster's 1913
- adj. Filthy; foul; dirty.
- adj. Vile; base; gross; mean.
- adj. Meanly avaricious; covetous; niggardly.
WordNet 3.0
- adj. morally degraded
- adj. unethical or dishonest
- adj. foul and run-down and repulsive
- adj. meanly avaricious and mercenary
Etymologies
- Middle English sordide, festering, purulent, from Latin sordidus, dirty, from sordēre, to be dirty.
Examples
“As a result of the grand jury's report on what it called "sordid, shocking acts," Monsignor William Lynn, former secretary of the clergy in the Archdiocese, faces charges of child endangerment.”
“DALLAS - Texas prosecutors on Thursday abruptly ended a three-year criminal probe into what they called a sordid small-town swinger's club where children as young as 5 were forced into performing sex.”
“The majority of the world's people live in sordid conditions, deprived of basic necessities.”
“Three years passed in sordid struggle and disappointment.”
“It’s all very fine in its way, but somehow it’s what I call sordid and the port is terrible.”
Cargo of Eagles
“Around this time, notice, he didn't give specific dates as he's, you know, recalling his sordid history he didn't give specific dates.”
“Russian literature, faced with the realities of modern life, a spirit titanic and in clash with its material, and produced in the mastery of this every-day material, commonly called sordid, a phantasmagoria intense with beauty.”
“The nomad and romantic in him, troubled and restless with Ukrainian myth, legend, and song, impressed upon Russian literature, faced with the realities of modern life, a spirit titanic and in clash with its material, and produced in the mastery of this every-day material, commonly called sordid, a phantasmagoria intense with beauty.”
“If you can recall the sordid scenario and silly media circus which surrounded the tawdry”
“• Après-ski that could be described as sordid and tacky”
Telegraph.co.uk: news, business, sport, the Daily Telegraph newspaper, Sunday Telegraph
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘sordid’.
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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 4084 more...
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@vcb.etym.prjct - SAT Catchall
brainfood for my hungry, eager pupils
iconoclast, glacial, agnostic, histrionic, treacly, contemptuous, captious, bombastic, bombast, perfidy, quiescence, sordid and 148 more...
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November Words-10033
sordid, protuberant, constabulary, confide, unsubstantiated, bureacrats, mammaries, tentative, enticingly, aberration, electro-acuscope, perithanatic and 18 more...
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Words to use more often
incommensurable, squalid, sordid, abscond, deranged, sagacity, enthralling, noctivagant, imperturbable, slither, sycophantic, ineffable and 2 more...
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mycological hues
rubescent, lutescent, cinereous, avellaneous, fuscous, fulvous, sordid, lurid, livid, ochre, ochraceous, vinaceous and 6 more...
katiegiles Johnathan Kellerman-Flesh and Blood: " I suppose. And Lauren did say she liked you... All right, its nothing sordid, anyway" Nov 12, 2010
bilby "Unless some formal inquiry is convened to look into a sordid history that reached its depths in the Bush era, and so begins to break this cycle of deceit, exposé, and paralysis followed by more of the same, we're likely, a few years hence, to find ourselves right back where we are now."
- Alfred W. McCoy, Confronting the CIA's Mind Maze, tomdispatch.com, 7 June 2009. Jun 8, 2009