Definitions

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

  • adjective Resistant to physical pressure; not pliant.
  • adjective Reluctant to yield or be swayed; recalcitrant.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Resisting pressure or the effect of it; acting against impulse by elastic force.
  • Persistently opposing.

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

  • adjective Resisting pressure or the effect of it; acting against impulse by elastic force.
  • adjective Persistently opposed.

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

  • adjective resistant to physical pressure; unyielding
  • adjective resistant to compulsion; recalcitrant

Etymologies

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

[Latin renītēns, renītent-, present participle of renītī, to resist : re-, re- + nītī, to press forward.]

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word renitent.

Examples

  • My eyes had grown so used to the dark in those watches of wandering through the entrails of the ship that, faint though the gleam shone, I could see the renitent surface under my feet and the mossy walls about me; I sheathed my knife then, and ran.

    The Urth of the New Sun Wolfe, Gene 1987

  • The gruesome deaths of the five Foke jarred him into the itchy, gummy, renitent physicality of his body.

    In Other Worlds Attanasio, A. A. 1984

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.

  • renitent – resisting physical pressure; resisting constraint or compulsion: recalcitrant

    July 26, 2008