Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • In grammar, irregular in inflection. Hence Deviating from ordinary forms or rules; irregular; anomalous.
  • noun In grammar, a word which is irregular or anomalous in declension or conjugation, or which deviates from the ordinary forms of inflection in words of a like kind. It is applied particularly to nouns having forms from different stems.
  • noun A person or thing that deviates from the regular or proper form.

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

  • noun (Gram.) A word which is irregular or anomalous either in declension or conjugation, or which deviates from ordinary forms of inflection in words of a like kind; especially, a noun which is irregular in declension.
  • noun Any thing or person deviating from the common rule, or from common forms.
  • adjective Deviating from ordinary forms or rules; irregular; anomalous; abnormal.

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

  • adjective Deviating from the ordinary rule; eccentric, abnormal.
  • adjective grammar Being irregularly declined or inflected.
  • noun A person who is unconventional; a maverick
  • noun grammar An irregularly declined or inflected word
  • noun linguistics A word whose etymological roots come from distinct, different languages or language groups.

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From late Latin heteroclitus, from Ancient Greek ἑτερόκλιτος (heteróklitos), from ἕτερος (héteros, "other, another, different") + κλίνω (klínō, "lean, incline"), the latter from Proto-Indo-European *ḱley-.

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Examples

  • Nicolas Sarkozy, French to his fingertips despite his heteroclite background two parts Hungarian, one part Greek/Jewish and one part French/French, seems to have absorbed the first, but not the second, of the above two maxims.

    Dr. Charles G. Cogan: Toujours de l'Audace! Dr. Charles G. Cogan 2011

  • Over the years Amis has learned how to notate a superbly comic speaking voice; getting it down on paper is comparable to a good composer's skill in scoring heteroclite sounds never before made by concert instruments.

    Martin Amis's 'The Pregnant Widow' Is A 'Strange, Sparkling Novel' (New York Review) 2010

  • That makes the in-color onlooker the heteroclite, and the urbane aesthetic cellist the metroclite.

    Heteroclite. Ann Althouse 2006

  • These instances might with propriety be reckoned among singular or heteroclite instances, for in the whole extent of nature they are of rare and extraordinary occurrence.

    The New Organon 2005

  • These instances might with propriety be reckoned among singular or heteroclite instances, for in the whole extent of nature they are of rare and extraordinary occurrence.

    Simia Quam Similis Nobis 2005

  • These instances might with propriety be reckoned among singular or heteroclite instances, for in the whole extent of nature they are of rare and extraordinary occurrence.

    Archive 2005-11-01 2005

  • Nor could I have dreamed the heteroclite crewmen I had met aboard Tzadkiel's ship, nor the jibers; and yet both had come from Briah, even as I; and Tzadkiel had not scrupled to take them into his service.

    The Urth of the New Sun Wolfe, Gene 1987

  • But even where he walked, amid a society intellectually fostering sentiment, in a land bowing to see the simplicity of the mystery paraded, Alvan's behaviour was passing heteroclite.

    The Tragic Comedians — Complete George Meredith 1868

  • But even where he walked, amid a society intellectually fostering sentiment, in a land bowing to see the simplicity of the mystery paraded, Alvan's behaviour was passing heteroclite.

    Complete Project Gutenberg Works of George Meredith George Meredith 1868

  • On the other hand, the heteroclite array of the dancers of the night before, torn from their slumbers, appeared in fantastic and ridiculous outline like the shades of a magic lantern; shawls, rugs, and even bed-quilts wrapped around them.

    Tartarin On The Alps Alphonse Daudet 1868

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