Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun The state or quality of being gross, in any sense; especially, indelicacy; rudeness; vulgarity.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun The state or quality of being gross; thickness; corpulence; coarseness; shamefulness.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun obsolete Size.
  • noun Lack of refinement in character, behaviour etc.; coarseness.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun the quality of lacking taste and refinement

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From gross +‎ -ness.

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Examples

  • Of the obstinate effort to bring about an armed intervention, on the lines marked out by Russell’s letter to Palmerston from Gotha, 17 September, 1862, nothing could be said beyond Gladstone’s plea in excuse for his speech in pursuance of the same effort, that it was “the most singular and palpable error, ” “the least excusable, ” “a mistake of incredible grossness, ” which passed defence; but while Gladstone threw himself on the mercy of the public for his speech, he attempted no excuse for Lord Russell who led him into the “incredible grossness” of announcing the Foreign Secretary’s intent.

    The Battle of the Rams (1863) 1918

  • Yet even here the grossness is but little more pronounced than what we find in our old drama (e. g.,

    The Book of The Thousand Nights And A Night 2006

  • With succeeding Lord Horror works, each one aims to out-do the preceding one in grossness.

    Ballardian » “Driven by Anger”: An Interview with Michael Butterworth (the Savoy interviews, part 1) 2009

  • ANY way was an act of violence, for what did it consist of but the obtrusion of the idea of grossness and guilt on a small helpless creature who had been for me a revelation of the possibilities of beautiful intercourse?

    The Turn of the Screw 2003

  • Hence a bumping lass is a large girl of her age, and a bumpkin is a large-limbed, uncivilized rustic; the idea of grossness of size entering into the idea of a country bumpkin, as well as that of unpolished rudeness.

    The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction Volume 14, No. 387, August 28, 1829 Various

  • They argue that Shakespeare's coarseness is the result of the age and not personal predilection, completely ignoring the work of men like Sir Philip Sidney and Spenser, indeed practically all the pre-Shakespearean writers, in whom none of this so-called grossness exists.

    Lysistrata 446? BC-385? BC Aristophanes

  • To do it in ANY way was an act of violence, for what did it consist of but the obtrusion of the idea of grossness and guilt on a small helpless creature who had been for me a revelation of the possibilities of beautiful intercourse?

    The Turn of the Screw 1935

  • To do it in any way was an act of violence, for what did it consist of but the obtrusion of the idea of grossness and guilt on a small helpless creature who had been for me a revelation of the possibilities of beautiful intercourse?

    The Turn of the Screw 1898

  • To do it in ANY way was an act of violence, for what did it consist of but the obtrusion of the idea of grossness and guilt on a small helpless creature who had been for me a revelation of the possibilities of beautiful intercourse?

    The Turn of the Screw Henry James 1879

  • It would be too simple to call grossness the last (or the next) frontier, although some critics out there will, but

    GreenCine Daily 2009

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