10 definitions found for pompous

Pompous POMP'OUS, a.
1. Displaying pomp; showy with grandeur; splendid; magnificent; as a pompous procession; a pompous triumph.
2. Ostentatious; boastful; as a pompous account of private adventures.

pompous adj 1: puffed up with vanity; "a grandiloquent and boastful manner"; "overblown oratory"; "a pompous speech"; "pseudo-scientific gobbledygook and pontifical hooey"- Newsweek [syn: grandiloquent, overblown, pompous, pontifical, portentous] 2: characterized by pomp and ceremony and stately display [syn: pompous, ceremonious]

pompous c.1375, "characterized by pomp," from O.Fr. pompeux, from L.L. pomposus "stately, pompous," from L. pompa "pomp." Pomposity is early 15c., from L.L. pompositas, from pomposus "stately, pompous." The sense of "ostentatious display" is from 1620, earlier in Fr. pomposit?

pompous adjective Date: 15th century 1. excessively elevated or ornate <pompous rhetoric> 2. having or exhibiting self-importance ; arrogant <a pompous politician> 3. relating to or suggestive of pomp ; magnificent • pompously adverb • pompousness noun

pompous
n.
1 self-important, affectedly grand or solemn.
2 (of language) pretentious; unduly grand in style.
3 archaic magnificent; splendid.
Derivatives:
pomposity n. (pl. -ies). pompously adv. pompousness n.
Etymology: ME f. OF pompeux f. LL pomposus (as POMP)

pompous 1. If you describe someone as pompous, you mean that they behave or speak in a very serious way because they think they are more important than they really are. He was somewhat pompous and had a high opinion of his own capabilities. ADJ [disapproval] • pompously Robin said pompously that he had an important business appointment. ADV: usu ADV with v 2. A pompous building or ceremony is very grand and elaborate. The service was grand without being pompous. ADJ

Pompous Pomp"ous, a. [F. pompeux, L. pomposus. See Pomp.] 1. Displaying pomp; stately; showy with grandeur; magnificent; as, a pompous procession. 2. Ostentatious; pretentious; boastful; vainlorious; as, pompous manners; a pompous style. ``Pompous in high presumption.'' --Chaucer. he pompous vanity of the old schoolmistress. --Thackeray. -- Pom"ous*ly, adv. -- Pomp"ous*ness, n.

pompous a. 1. Showy, ostentatious, stately, lofty, grand, majestic, magnificent, superb, splendid, august, magisterial, dignified. 2. Swelling, inflated, bombastic, turgid, pretentious, stilted, boastful, grandiloquent, high-flowing, high-sounding, high-flown, ostentatious, tumid, grandiose, magniloquent, flaunting, puffy.

pompous ˈpɔmpəs adj. 1 vain, vainglorious, proud, arrogant, pretentious, ostentatious, showy, grandiose, haughty, overbearing, conceited, egotistical, self-important, boastful, braggart, inflated, snobbish, magisterial, imperious, pontifical, affected, exhibitionist, Colloq uppity, highfalutin or hifalutin, hoity-toity, high-hat, Slang snooty, snotty: Don't you despise the pompous way Marshall struts about in that ridiculous uniform? 2 bombastic, flowery, grandiloquent, pedantic, stuffy, fustian, orotund, ornate, embroidered, flatulent, windy, turgid, inflated, high-flown, euphuistic: He's always making long-winded, pompous speeches because he loves the sound of his own voice.

147 Moby Thesaurus words for "pompous": Gongoresque, Johnsonian, Latinate, affected, arrogant, assured, aureate, awkward, bedizened, big-sounding, bloated, boastful, bombastic, braggart, ceremonial, ceremonious, cocksure, conceited, confident, conventional, convinced, convoluted, cramped, cumbrous, decided, declamatory, decorous, determined, egotistical, elephantine, elevated, embroidered, euphuistic, exhibitionist, flamboyant, flaming, flashy, flatulent, flaunting, flossy, flowery, forced, formal, fulsome, fustian, garish, gassy, gaudy, grandiloquent, grandiose, grandisonant, guinde, halting, haughty, heavy, hieratic, high-flowing, high-flown, high-flying, high-hat, high-sounding, highfalutin, hoity-toity, hubristic, imperious, important, inflated, inkhorn, labored, labyrinthine, leaden, lexiphanic, liturgic, lofty, lumbering, lurid, magisterial, magniloquent, meretricious, narcissistic, ornate, orotund, ostentatious, overbearing, overblown, overconfident, overdone, overelaborate, overinvolved, oversure, overweening, overwrought, pedantic, persuaded, poised, ponderous, pontifical, positive, presumptuous, pretentious, proud, puffy, reassured, rhetorical, ritual, ritualistic, sacerdotal, secure, self-assured, self-centered, self-conceited, self-confident, self-important, self-reliant, selfish, sensational, sensationalistic, sententious, sesquipedalian, showy, snobbish, snooty, snotty, solemn, sonorous, stately, stiff, stilted, stuck-up, stuffy, sure, swollen, tall, tortuous, tumid, turgid, unafraid, undoubting, unfaltering, unhesitating, unwavering, unwieldy, uppity, vain, vainglorious, well-mannered, windy