Pugnacious

3 definitions found

From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]:

  Pugnacious \Pug*na"cious\, a. [L. pugnax, -acis, fr. pugnare to
     fight. Cf. {Pugilism}, {Fist}.]
     Disposed to fight; inclined to fighting; quarrelsome;
     fighting. --{Pug*na"cious*ly}, adv. -- {Pug*na"cious*ness},
     n.
     [1913 Webster]



From WordNet (r) 2.0 [wn]:

  pugnacious
       adj 1: tough and callous by virtue of experience [syn: {hard-bitten},
               {hard-boiled}]
       2: ready and able to resort to force or violence; "pugnacious
          spirits...lamented that there was so little prospect of an
          exhilarating disturbance"- Herman Melville; "they were
          rough and determined fighting men" [syn: {rough}]

From Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0 [moby-thes]:

  66 Moby Thesaurus words for "pugnacious":
     aggressive, antagonistic, battling, bellicose, belligerent,
     bickering, bloodthirsty, bloody, bloody-minded, brawling,
     chauvinist, chauvinistic, combative, contentious, disputatious,
     divisive, enemy, eristic, factional, factious, ferocious, fierce,
     fight, fighting, full of fight, hawkish, hostile, inimical,
     irascible, irritable, jingo, jingoish, jingoist, jingoistic,
     litigious, martial, militant, militaristic, military, offensive,
     partisan, polarizing, polemic, pushing, pushy, quarrelsome,
     rebellious, saber-rattling, sanguinary, sanguineous, savage,
     scrappy, self-assertive, shrewish, soldierlike, soldierly,
     trigger-happy, truculent, unfriendly, unpacific, unpeaceable,
     unpeaceful, warlike, warmongering, warring, wrangling