disdainful

UK/dɪsˈdeɪn.fəl/

adjectiveC2Rare in speech; mostly a word you read · #14,384 of 15,258neutral

Disdainful means showing that you consider something beneath you. The look, rather than the argument.

It takes of. The word describes manner above all, so a disdainful glance, a disdainful sniff and a disdainful tone are its natural homes. What separates it from contemptuous is temperature, since disdain is cool and contempt is hot. Cats are described as disdainful more often than any other animal, and the word suits them. The noun is disdain and the verb means to reject something as unworthy.

Definitions of disdainful

1adjectivedisdainfulShowing that you think someone or something is beneath you.C2
“He gave a disdainful shrug and walked away.”

Where it comes from

Old French
desdeignier
Middle English
disdeynen
English
disdain
English, today
disdainful

From disdain + ful. disdain comes from Middle English disdeynen, from Old French desdeignier (modern French dédaigner).

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practised in A Man Called Ove

First appears in chapter 12 of A Man Called Ove.

Practise this word

disdainful in the wild

Individuals with a superiority complex typically come across as arrogant, prideful, and disdainful toward others.
Superiority complex
According to Castle, this is the case in some Swiss rapiers, but flamberge quickly became a disdainful term in France to refer to flamboyant swords.
Flamberge
Marco was commonly regarded as a very courteous and well-learned man, but disdainful and choleric.
Marco Lombardo
Where was now the Margaret of the short, disdainful laugh?
The Yeoman Adventurer· George W. Gough

From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.

From Project Gutenberg, public domain. These sentences are from real books, shown to illustrate the word at work.

Related words

the desdeignier family

disdain

disdainful — used about once every 54,060 pages · #14,384 · point at the bar for the others

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