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. of a liquid or fatty substance Oily or greasy.
- adj. of a wine, coffee, etc. Rich, lush, intense, with layers of concentrated, soft, velvety flavor.
- adj. by extension, of a person 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
- From Medieval Latin unctuōsus (“oily”), from Latin unguere, ungere ("to anoint"). (Wiktionary)
- Middle English, from Old French unctueus, from Medieval Latin ūnctuōsus, from Latin ūnctum, ointment, from neuter past participle of unguere, to anoint. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“The staff in unctuous to regulars and condescending to those of us who still dress as if we lived in Seattle.”
“Now, I don't know if my unctuous is the same as your unctuous, you know, so - but it came out great.”
“Everyone will recall the unctuous Walter Cronkite, a man with a face only a nation could love, interviewing an out-of-control Mayor Richard J. Daley, a man with a face that during that convention a whole nation came to loathe.”
“BTW: the word "unctuous" used above is not a misspelling.”
“And then I tasted it, and it, you know, had this kind of unctuous, porty richness, which is characteristic of that wine -- that it sort of resembles port in a lot of ways.”
“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!”
“The _Edinburgh New Philosophical Journal_, 13-368, mentions an "unctuous" substance that fell near Rotterdam, in 1832.”
“The paragraph continued on its way through the press, and whenever he took up a newspaper he seemed to come upon it, slightly modified, variously developed, but always reverting with a kind of unctuous irony to his financial preoccupations and his wife's consequent loneliness.”
“I dislike the sound of the word "unctuous", it sounds like the reviewer is trying too hard.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘unctuous’.
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Familiar
Just a list of words
fulminate, unctuous, malediction, lumpenproletariat, descry, surfeit, sententious, supernumerary, unabashed, picayune, obliterate, decry and 122 more...
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Iaan
dirigisme, dystopia, cacotopia, ex ante, veritable, indefatigable, curmudgeon, desultory, antediluvian, transmogrify, pendent, elongate and 272 more...
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AFET - diplomacy
broker a peace ac..., client state, deadlocked peace ..., embassy, freeze, goodwill ambassador, hinterland, interfere in dome..., intervene personally, maintain technica..., mediation, no business as usual and 670 more...
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my fab list
blowsabella, aperçu, froideur, salubrious, abject, gallipot, mumchance, wainscot, virago, macerate, lascivious, clandestine and 181 more...
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phrontistery-u
from phrontistery.info
uakari, uberous, uberty, ubication, ubiety, ubique, ubiquitarianism, ubity, ucalegon, udal, udometer, ufology and 175 more...
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words 1
Traduce, Ramify, precipitous, rapture, adumbrate, knell, smolder, vagary, choleric, sibylline, hypocritical, jejune and 185 more...
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Jesse's random
bathos, dragoman, tessellated, escutcheon, eikon, mondaine, basilisk, ciborium, rubric, machicolation, jet, defalcation and 198 more...
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Words build meanings from origins( et...
These come from gamma meditation ,I think.
discursive, exogenous, machinations, purportedly, sumptuous, congruity, cantankerous, incongruous, festoon, hessian, ratiocinative, stratigraphic and 2057 more...
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January 2012
bloviate, pastiche, apparat, facile, paroxysm, pique, bedfellow, pedigree, tutelage, protege, protégé, retroactive and 196 more...
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People are Scum
words that one may enjoy using to describe other people or their actions
degenerate, reprobate, scapegrace, capricious, sycophant, arbitrary, infernal, abominable, iniquitous, nefarious, philistine, sadistic and 39 more...
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Favorite adjectives - sinfully delici...
words that, when used in an unusual context, make you stop, stare, and read the sentence over and over again. LisaWrites - resource
sycophantic, doughface, unctuous, sebaceous, oleaginous, diabolic, ostent, sudatory, bulbous, pustule, bauble, trinket and 6 more...
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against nature
perambulator, dross, elephantine, unctuous, saccharine, sacerdotal, torrefaction, heliotrope, prostration, peremptory, lava grey, mouse grey and 3 more...
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Words from Moby Dick
frigate, presumptuous, genteel, succor, hearthstone, gentry, factitious, bilious, insurgent, portent, enervate, genuflect and 303 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 174 more...
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All The Words
I enjoy collecting words, for I have no fear of them ever running out.
anacoluthon, defenestration, hypnopomp, hypnagogue, idioglossia, panopticon, tatterdemalion, abalone, caltrop, miasma, paroxysm, smalt and 491 more...
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ICE
quincunx, adoxography, panjundrum, breloque, surd, scripturient, rousant, favrile, embouchure, aquarelle, griffonage, sussultatory and 491 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for unctuous.
Casey "Isaac had been staring anxiously at the class when that unctuous bastard Vermishank had looked in." From Perdido Street Station by China Meiville. Sep 18, 2011
milosrdenstvi This word is the first that comes to mind to describe Mr. Collins from Pride and Prejudice. Aug 5, 2008
yarb 'The coffee is free,'
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
reesetee Have no fear. Sionnach's on it. :-) Oct 9, 2007
chained_bear See also extreme unction, which I certainly hope someone has listed on their "Catholic Words" list... Oct 9, 2007
seanahan "Now we can all be unctuous British gossip bitches" - Jordan McDeere, Studio 60 Oct 9, 2007
oroboros Greasy uncle? Oct 8, 2007
nicsims -excessive piousness
-oily or soapy feel Sep 14, 2007