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Webster 1913 Edition


Obstreperous

Ob-strep′er-ous

,
Adj.
[L.
obstreperus
, from
obstrepere
to make a noise at;
ob
(see
Ob-
) +
strepere
to make a noise.]
1.
Attended by, or making, a loud and tumultuous noise; clamorous; noisy; vociferous.
“The obstreperous city.”
Wordsworth.
Obstreperous approbation.”
Addison.
Beating the air with their
obstreperous
beaks.
B. Jonson.
Ob-strep′er-ous-ly
,
adv.
Ob-strep′er-ous-ness
,
Noun.

Webster 1828 Edition


Obstreperous

OBSTREP'EROUS

,
Adj.
[L. obstreperus, from obstrepo, to roar; ob and strepo.]
Loud; noisy; clamorous; vociferous; making a tumultuous noise.
The players do not only connive at his obstreperous approbation, but repair at their own cost whatever damages he makes.

Definition 2024


obstreperous

obstreperous

English

Adjective

obstreperous (comparative more obstreperous, superlative most obstreperous)

  1. Attended by, or making, a loud and tumultuous noise; boisterous.
    • 1809, Washington Irving, Knickerbocker's History of New York, ch. 7:
      [O]n a clear still summer evening you may hear from the battery of New York the obstreperous peals of broad-mouthed laughter of the Dutch negroes at Communipaw.
    • 1855, Robert Browning, "Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came":
      . . . my hope
      Dwindled into a ghost not fit to cope
      With that obstreperous joy success would bring
    • 1918, Henry B. Fuller, On the Stairs, ch. 3:
      He developed an obstreperous baritone . . . and he made himself rather preponderant, whether he happened to know the song or not.
  2. Stubbornly defiant; disobedient; resistant to authority or control, whether in a noisy manner or not.
    • 1827, Sir Walter Scott, The Journal of Sir Walter Scott, October 1827:
      [W]e came to Whittingham. Thence to Newcastle, where an obstreperous horse retarded us for an hour at least.
    • 1903, Lucy Maud Montgomery, "A Sandshore Wooing" in Short Stories: 1902-1903:
      My dress was draggled, my hat had slipped back, and the kinks and curls of my obstreperous hair were something awful.
    • 1915, Stewart Edward White, The Gray Dawn, ch. 70:
      They reviled the committee collectively and singly; bragged that they would shoot Coleman, Truett, Durkee, and some others at sight; flourished weapons, and otherwise became so publicly and noisily obstreperous that the committee decided they needed a lesson.

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