Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Characterized by affected, exaggerated, or insincere earnestness: "the unctuous, complacent court composer who is consumed with envy and self-loathing” ( Rhoda Koenig).
- adj. Having the quality or characteristics of oil or ointment; slippery.
- adj. Containing or composed of oil or fat.
- adj. Abundant in organic materials; soft and rich: unctuous soil.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- Of the nature of or resembling an unguent or ointment; greasy; oily; fat; soapy.
- oily, or soapy feel when rubbed or touched by the fingers—a characteristic of steatite, talc, serpentine, and other magnesian minerals, due to the magnesia which they contain.
- Having or characterized by unction; tending to religious fervor; especially, falsely or affectedly fervid, devotional, emotional, gushing, or the like; excessively bland or suave.
Wiktionary
- adj. Oily or greasy.
- adj. Rich, lush, intense, with layers of concentrated, soft, velvety flavor.
- adj. Profusely polite, especially unpleasantly so and insincerely earnest.
GNU Webster's 1913
- adj. Of the nature or quality of an unguent or ointment; fatty; oily; greasy.
- adj. Having a smooth, greasy feel, as certain minerals.
- adj. Bland; suave; also, tender; fervid; ; sometimes, insincerely suave or fervid.
WordNet 3.0
- adj. unpleasantly and excessively suave or ingratiating in manner or speech
Etymologies
- Middle English, from Old French unctueus, from Medieval Latin ūnctuōsus, from Latin ūnctum, ointment, from neuter past participle of unguere, to anoint.
Examples
“The staff in unctuous to regulars and condescending to those of us who still dress as if we lived in Seattle.”
“This kind of unctuous posturing doesn't exactly make traditionalists insecure in their position; it tends to make traditionalists cranky, because the hypocrisy is pretty evident.”
“My friend Nico and I have a longstanding & ongoing correspondence about this sort of meat, he sends me "unctuous" links very regularly!”
“I dislike the sound of the word "unctuous", it sounds like the reviewer is trying too hard.”
“I encourage you to take a look at the Environment Canada Website that provides a lot of useful information about climate and climate change which may open your mind - cjohnson, do you understand the meaning of the word "unctuous"?”
“ccarpita: I dislike the sound of the word "unctuous", it sounds amark22 12 minutes ago 2:33 PM”
“Already irritated with Speaker John Bercow for being long-winded, unctuous and perceptibly anti-Conservative in the House of Commons, the idea that his Labour-supporting wife would go on the programme's Channel 5 reincarnation had been a red rag to the proverbial.”
The Guardian: Sally Bercow brings some order to the Big Brother house
“The sea is key, as the cool air affects the ripening of the grapes, imparting a restrained, dry, unctuous nose with notes of lime.”
“When you hear a sports analyst discuss the Patriots, they almost always use an affected, hushed tone, the way an unctuous dinner guest does when whispering about Harvard, the Vineyard, or El Bulli.”
The Wall Street Journal: The Patriots and Jets Will Save Your Soul
“On a recent visit, the Lava Nachos—rice chips with raw tuna, melted jack cheese, avocado and other toppings for $7—were salty and unctuous from the melted cheese.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘unctuous’.
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January 2012
pique, pedigree, tutelage, epochal, verisimilitude, bloviate, jocular, jocund, gleam, babel, apparat, bedfellow and 196 more...
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Adjectival Arcana
A roster of adjectives that infrequently surface in typical conversation and writing. Many are dredged from scientific or other technical jargon or sieved from examples of disused archaic forms.
unitegmic, acaulescent, reticuloendothelial, ingressive, uniate, acanthopterygian, ossific, epiphysial, perivisceral, acœlomatous, cestoid, acælomate and 7762 more...
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People are Scum
words that one may enjoy using to describe other people or their actions
degenerate, reprobate, scapegrace, arbitrary, abominable, philistine, malignant, parasitic, capricious, iniquitous, pernicious, deprave and 21 more...
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Words to remember
antithetic, authenticity, bellicose, calling card, canticle, catharsis, chatoyant, frippet, furore, pithy, unctuous, eclectic and 133 more...
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Amber's list
This is a list of my favorite words, words that sound beautiful, or ones that have inspired me. I usually most enjoy words for which I can strongly associate pictures. I hope this list will also ...
clandestine, sumptuous, erogenous, operose, evanescent, panache, sparge, ludicrous, wholehearted, anodyne, eclat, legerdemain and 2 more...
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Favorite Words
Fun words that are interesting and arresting.
Ort, unctuous, panoply, defenestrate, palpable, ubiquitous, flagellate, serendipitous, epiphanic, constructivist, amuse bouche, sobriquet and 30 more...
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Hana's Vocab
ipseism, jape, raphe, mullions and tran..., Olbers' Paradox, Euclidian torus, relativity of sim..., Cerenkov radiation, tachyon, superluminal, hapax legomenon, damascene and 299 more...
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adj. + adv.
vainglorious, lanuginous, altiloquent, ambisextrous, desiderative, flothery, liquescent, logoed, autotelic, tropology, erotogenic, crocky and 96 more...
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random
words I read but don't know
nascent, proxy, desultory, charlatan, churlish, emaciated, gaudy, shill, lurid, frisson, marauding, plunder and 610 more...
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Vocab++
Words as I learn them.
fetid, mezzanine, hiatus, austerity, subliminal, resplendent, implacable, impugn, debase, exiguous, cirque, holster and 2536 more...
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Awesome
Awesome words
mimsy, detritus, skive, canonise, nascence, concupiscence, tumescent, ophidian, houri, vorpal, cyprian, Delphic and 100 more...
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SCRUBJAYS IDIOM
EXTRAPOLATE, altruistic, misanthropic, predicate, pejoritive, disparaging, bucolic, sylvan, veracity, autodidact, jejune, erudite and 110 more...
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Words To Use In Creative Writing
hag-ridden, light-heeled, wendigo, longshanks, fatuous, insipid, sodden, bulging, sycophantic, uncourtly, gauche, assuasive and 98 more...
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Big Book #2 List
absolution, restitution, contrition, moratorium, nautical, nirvana, pandemonium, perennial, symposium, dialectic, dipsomaniacal, ecumenical and 117 more...
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x
recidivate, peripatetic, insipid, otiose, epeolatry, verisimilitude, antilogy, extirpate, noetic, mordant, susurrous, vatic and 188 more...
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Derideo's Words
obdurate, obstinate, behest, injunction, enjoin, circumspect, ensconce, discursive, lugubrious, doleful, somber, ken and 2476 more...
an unctuous maître d'hôtel
once told him at lunch.
'If it's free it is ghastly,
or you, sir, are a jackass.'
- Peter Reading, Limns, from Tom O' Bedlam's Beauties, 1981 Jun 28, 2008
-oily or soapy feel Sep 14, 2007