Adjacent Words

Repellent definitions

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Webster's 1828 Dictionary

REPEL'LENT, a. Driving back; able or tending to repel.
REPEL'LENT, n. In medicine, a medicine which drives back morbid humors into the mass of the blood, from which they were unduly secreted; or which prevents such an afflux of fluid to a part, as would raise it to a tumor; a discutient.

WordNet (r) 3.0 (2005)

adj
1: serving or tending to repel; "he became rebarbative and prickly and spiteful"; "I find his obsequiousness repellent" [syn: rebarbative, repellent, repellant]
2: highly offensive; arousing aversion or disgust; "a disgusting smell"; "distasteful language"; "a loathsome disease"; "the idea of eating meat is repellent to me"; "revolting food"; "a wicked stench" [syn: disgusting, disgustful, distasteful, foul, loathly, loathsome, repellent, repellant, repelling, revolting, skanky, wicked, yucky]
3: incapable of absorbing or mixing with; "a water-repellent fabric"; "plastic highly resistant to steam and water" [syn: repellent, resistant] n
1: a compound with which fabrics are treated to repel water [syn: repellent, repellant]
2: a chemical substance that repels animals [syn: repellent, repellant]
3: the power to repel; "she knew many repellents to his advances" [syn: repellent, repellant]

Merriam Webster's

I. adjective also repellant Etymology: Latin repellent-, repellens, present participle of repellere Date: 1643 1. serving or tending to drive away or ward off — often used in combination <a mosquito-repellent spray> 2. arousing aversion or disgust ; repulsive • repellently adverb II. noun also repellant Date: 1661 something that repels; especially a substance that repels insects

Oxford Reference Dictionary

adj. & n. --adj. 1 that repels. 2 disgusting, repulsive. --n. a substance that repels esp. insects etc. Derivatives: repellence n. repellency n. repellently adv. Etymology: L repellere (as REPEL)

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Repellent Re*pel"lent (-lent), a. [L. repellens, -entis, p. pr. ] Driving back; able or tending to repel.

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Repellent Re*pel"lent, n. 1. That which repels. 2. (Med.) A remedy to repel from a tumefied part the fluids which render it tumid. --Dunglison. 3. A kind of waterproof cloth. --Knight.

Collin's Cobuild Dictionary

(repellents) Note: The spelling 'repellant' is also used for meaning 2. 1. If you think that something is horrible and disgusting you can say that it is repellent. (FORMAL) ...a very large, very repellent toad... ADJ 2. Insect repellent is a product containing chemicals that you spray into the air or on your body in order to keep insects away. ...mosquito repellent. N-MASS: usu n N

Soule's Dictionary of English Synonyms

a. Repulsive, repelling.

Moby Thesaurus

abhorrent, abominable, base, beastly, below contempt, beneath contempt, complaining, contemptible, crude, despicable, detestable, diamagnetic, disagreeable, disgusting, disputatious, disputing, dissentient, dissenting, distasteful, execrable, fetid, forbidding, foul, fractious, fulsome, gross, hateful, heinous, ignoble, invidious, loathsome, malodorous, mephitic, miasmal, miasmic, nasty, nauseating, nauseous, noisome, noncooperative, noxious, objecting, objectionable, obnoxious, obscene, obstructive, odious, of opposite polarity, offensive, on the barricades, proof against, protesting, rebarbative, rebellious, recalcitrant, refractory, reluctant, renitent, repelling, repugnant, repulsive, resistant, resisting, resistive, retardant, retardative, revolting, revulsive, sickening, stinking, uncongenial, uncooperative, ungenial, unsubmissive, unsympathetic, unyielding, up in arms, vile, withstanding