Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Of, relating to, or characteristic of an enemy.
  • adjective Feeling or showing enmity or ill will.
  • adjective Being in opposition; opposed.
  • adjective Unfavorable to health or well-being; inhospitable or adverse.
  • noun An antagonistic person or thing.
  • noun An enemy in warfare.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Of or pertaining to an enemy: as, hostile ground.
  • Of inimical character or tendency; having or exhibiting enmity or antagonism; antagonistic: as, a hostile manifesto; hostile criticism.
  • Synonyms Averse, Adverse, Inimical, Hostile; unfriendly, warlike. Averse applies to feeling, adverse to action: as, I was very averse to his going; an adverse vote; adverse fortune. Inimical expresses both feeling and action, generally in private affairs. Hostile also expresses both feeling and action, but applies especially to public affairs; where it applies to private matters, it expresses either strong or conspicuous action or feeling, or both, or all.
  • noun An enemy: specifically, in the United States, a hostile Indian; an Indian who is engaged in warfare against the whites.

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

  • adjective Belonging or appropriate to an enemy; showing the disposition of an enemy; showing ill will and malevolence, or a desire to thwart and injure; occupied by an enemy or enemies; inimical; unfriendly
  • noun colloq. An enemy; esp., an American Indian in arms against the whites; -- commonly in the plural.

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

  • adjective Belonging or appropriate to an enemy; showing the disposition of an enemy; showing ill will and malevolence, or a desire to thwart and injure; occupied by an enemy or enemies; inimical; unfriendly
  • noun An enemy.

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

  • adjective unsolicited and resisted by the management of the target company ( used of attempts to buy or take control of a business)
  • noun troops belonging to the enemy's military forces
  • adjective characterized by enmity or ill will
  • adjective very unfavorable to life or growth
  • adjective impossible to bring into friendly accord
  • adjective not belonging to your own country's forces or those of an ally

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Latin hostīlis, from hostis, enemy; see ghos-ti- in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

16th Century: from Latin hostīlis, from hostis ("enemy").

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Examples

Comments

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  • In wordplay, a word wherein no letter can be inserted anywhere to form another word: e.g., ahem.

    --Chris Cole, Wordplay

    May 24, 2008

  • Hostility sounds better than hostile.

    July 18, 2009