Contemptible \Con*tempt"i*ble\, a.
1. Worthy of contempt; deserving of scorn or disdain; mean;
vile; despicable. --Milton.
[1913 Webster]
The arguments of tyranny are ascontemptible as its
force is dreadful. --Burke.
[1913 Webster]
2. Despised; scorned; neglected; abject. --Locke.
[1913 Webster]
3. Insolent; scornful; contemptuous. [Obs.]
[1913 Webster]
If she should make tender of her love, 't is very
possible he 'll scorn it; for the man . . . hath a
contemptible spirit. --Shak.
Syn: Despicable; abject; vile; mean; base; paltry; worthless;
sorry; pitiful; scurrile. See Contemptuous.
Usage: Contemptible, Despicable, Pitiful, Paltry.
Despicable is stronger than contemptible, as despise
is stronger than contemn. It implies keen
disapprobation, with a mixture of anger. A man is
despicable chiefly for low actions which mark his
life, such as servility, baseness, or mean adulation.
A man is contemptible for mean qualities which
distinguish his character, especially those which show
him to be weak, foolish, or worthless. Treachery is
despicable, egotism is contemptible. Pitiful and
paltry are applied to cases which are beneath anger,
and are simply contemptible in a high degree.
[1913 Webster]
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48
contemptible
adj 1: deserving of contempt or scorn [ant: estimable]
2: worthy only of being despised and rejected; "a contemptible
lack of courage"; "A little, wretched, despicable
creature, a worm, a mere nothing...that has risen up in
contempt against the majesty of Heaven and earth"-
Jonathan Edwards [syn: despicable]
WordNet (r) 2.0
136 Moby Thesaurus words for "contemptible":
abhorrent, abject, abominable, arrant, atrocious, awful, bad, base,
beastly, beggarly, below contempt, beneath contempt, blameworthy,
brutal, cheap, cheesy, common, crude, crummy, debased, degraded,
deplorable, depraved, despicable, detestable, dire, dirty,
disgusting, dreadful, egregious, enormous, execrable, fetid,
filthy, flagrant, forbidding, foul, fulsome, gaudy, gimcracky,
grave, grievous, gross, hateful, heinous, horrible, horrid,
ignoble, ignominious, infamous, inferior, lamentable, little,
loathsome, lousy, low, low-down, lumpen, malodorous, mangy, mean,
measly, mephitic, meretricious, miasmal, miasmic, miserable,
monstrous, nasty, nauseating, nefarious, noisome, notorious,
noxious, objectionable, obnoxious, obscene, odious, offensive,
outcast, outrageous, paltry, pathetic, petty, pitiable, pitiful,
poky, poor, rank, rebarbative, regrettable, repellent,
reprehensible, reptilian, repugnant, repulsive, revolting, rotten,
rubbishy, sad, scabby, scandalous, schlock, scrubby, scruffy,
scummy, scurvy, scuzzy, shabby, shameful, shocking, shoddy,
sickening, small, sordid, sorry, squalid, stinking, terrible,
too bad, trashy, trumpery, two-for-a-cent, two-for-a-penny,
twopenny, twopenny-halfpenny, unclean, unmentionable, unworthy,
valueless, vile, villainous, woeful, worst, worthless, wretched
Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0
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