Adjacent Words

Curiosity definitions

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Webster's 1828 Dictionary

CURIOSITY, n. [L. See Curious.]
1. A strong desire to see something novel, or to discover something unknown, either by research or inquiry; a desire to gratify the senses with a sight of what is new or unusual, or to gratify the mind with new discoveries; inquisitiveness. A mans curiosity leads him to view the ruins of Balbec, to investigate the origin of Homer, to discover the component parts of a mineral, or the motives of anothers actions.
2. Nicety; delicacy.
3. Accuracy; exactness; nice performance; curiousness; as the curiosity of workmanship.
4. A nice experiment; a thing unusual or worthy of curiosity.
There hath been practiced a curiosity, to set a tree on the north side of a walk and at a little height, to draw it through the wall, etc.
5. An object of curiosity; that which excites a desire of seeing, or deserves to be seen, as novel and extraordinary.
We took a ramble together to see the curiosities of this great town.
[The first and last senses are chiefly used.]

WordNet (r) 3.0 (2005)

n
1: a state in which you want to learn more about something [syn: curiosity, wonder]
2: something unusual -- perhaps worthy of collecting [syn: curio, curiosity, oddity, oddment, peculiarity, rarity]

Merriam Webster's

noun (plural -ties) Date: 14th century 1. desire to know: a. inquisitive interest in others' concerns ; nosiness b. interest leading to inquiry <intellectual curiosity> 2. archaic undue nicety or fastidiousness 3. a. one that arouses interest especially for uncommon or exotic characteristics b. an unusual knickknack ; curio c. a curious trait or aspect

Oxford Reference Dictionary

n. (pl. -ies) 1 an eager desire to know; inquisitiveness. 2 strangeness. 3 a strange, rare, or interesting object. Etymology: ME f. OF curiouseté f. L curiositas -tatis (as CURIOUS)

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Curiosity Cu`ri*os"i*ty (k[=u]`r[i^]*[o^]s"[i^]*t[y^]), n.; pl. Curiosities (-t[i^]z). [OE. curiouste, curiosite, OF. curioset['e], curiosit['e], F. curiosit['e], fr. L. curiositas, fr. curiosus. See Curious, and cf. Curio.] 1. The state or quality or being curious; nicety; accuracy; exactness; elaboration. [Obs.] --Bacon. When thou wast in thy gilt and thy perfume, they mocked thee for too much curiosity. --Shak. A screen accurately cut in tapiary work . . . with great curiosity. --Evelin. 2. Disposition to inquire, investigate, or seek after knowledge; a desire to gratify the mind with new information or objects of interest; inquisitiveness. --Milton. 3. That which is curious, or fitted to excite or reward attention. We took a ramble together to see the curiosities of this great town. --Addison. There hath been practiced also a curiosity, to set a tree upon the north side of a wall, and, at a little hieght, to draw it through the wall, etc. --Bacon.

Collin's Cobuild Dictionary

(curiosities) 1. Curiosity is a desire to know about something. Ryle accepted more out of curiosity than anything else... To satisfy our own curiosity we traveled to Baltimore. N-UNCOUNT 2. A curiosity is something that is unusual, interesting, and fairly rare. There is much to see in the way of castles, curiosities, and museums... N-COUNT

Soule's Dictionary of English Synonyms

n. 1. Inquisitiveness. 2. Phenomenon, wonder, marvel, rarity, sight, spectacle.

Moby Thesaurus

abnormality, amazement, anomaly, ardor, astonishing thing, astonishment, bauble, bric-a-brac, cathexis, concern, concernment, concupiscence, conversation piece, curio, desideration, desire, drive, eagerness, enthusiasm, exception, fancy, fantasy, freak, gazingstock, gewgaw, hope, horme, improbability, inquisitiveness, intellectual curiosity, interest, interestedness, interference, intrusiveness, libido, lust for learning, marvel, marvelment, matter of interest, meddlesomeness, mind, miracle, monstrosity, museum piece, need, nonesuch, nosiness, objet d'art, oddity, passion, phenomenon, pleasure, pleasure principle, prodigiosity, prodigy, prying, questioning, quite a thing, rarity, regard, sensation, sexual desire, sight, snooping, something else, special interest, spectacle, strange thing, stunner, thirst for knowledge, trinket, urge, want, wanting, will, will and pleasure, wish, wish fulfillment, wonder, wonderful thing, wonderment