Adjacent Words

irascible definitions

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WordNet (r) 3.0 (2005)

adj
1: quickly aroused to anger; "a hotheaded commander" [syn: choleric, irascible, hotheaded, hot-tempered, quick-tempered, short-tempered]
2: characterized by anger; "a choleric outburst"; "an irascible response" [syn: choleric, irascible]

Merriam Webster's

adjective Etymology: Middle French, from Late Latin irascibilis, from Latin irasci to become angry, be angry, from ira Date: circa 1530 marked by hot temper and easily provoked anger • irascibility noun • irascibleness noun • irascibly adverb

Oxford Reference Dictionary

adj. irritable; hot-tempered. Derivatives: irascibility n. irascibly adv. Etymology: ME f. F f. LL irascibilis f. L irasci grow angry f. ira anger

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Irascible I*ras"ci*ble, a. [L. irascibilis, fr. irasci to be angry, ira anger: cf. F. irascible. See Ire.] Prone to anger; easily provoked or inflamed to anger; choleric; irritable; as, an irascible man; an irascible temper or mood. -- I*ras"ci*ble*ness, n. -- I*ras"ci*bly, adv.

Collin's Cobuild Dictionary

If you describe someone as irascible, you mean that they become angry very easily. (WRITTEN) He had an irascible temper. = fiery ADJ

Soule's Dictionary of English Synonyms

a. Irritable, touchy, testy, waspish, quick, snappish, splenetic, petulant, choleric, peppery, hot, hasty, like tinder, like touchwood.

Moby Thesaurus

agitable, bearish, bitchy, cankered, cantankerous, churlish, contrary, crabbed, cranky, cross, cross-grained, crusty, cussed, difficult, disagreeable, edgy, emotional, emotionally unstable, eruptive, excitable, explosive, feisty, fractious, froward, high-mettled, high-spirited, high-strung, highly emotional, huffish, huffy, inflammable, irritable, mean, mettlesome, nervous, ornery, perturbable, perverse, prickly, sensitive, skittish, snappish, spiteful, spleeny, splenetic, startlish, stuffy, sulky, sullen, testy, touchy, ugly, volcanic, waspish, wayward, wrongheaded