'Meretricious' definitions:
Definition of 'meretricious'
From: WordNet
adjective
Like or relating to a prostitute; "meretricious relationships"
adjective
Tastelessly showy; "a flash car"; "a flashy ring"; "garish colors"; "a gaudy costume"; "loud sport shirts"; "a meretricious yet stylish book"; "tawdry ornaments" [syn: brassy, cheap, flash, flashy, garish, gaudy, gimcrack, loud, meretricious, tacky, tatty, tawdry, trashy]
adjective
Definition of 'Meretricious'
From: GCIDE
- Meretricious \Mer`e*tri"cious\, a. [L. meretricius, from meretrix, -icis, a prostitute, lit., one who earns money, i. e., by prostitution, fr. merere to earn, gain. See Merit.]
- 1. Of or pertaining to prostitutes; having to do with harlots; lustful; as, meretricious traffic. [1913 Webster]
- 2. Resembling the arts of a harlot; alluring by false show; gaudily and deceitfully ornamental; tawdry; as, meretricious dress or ornaments. [1913 Webster]
- 3. Deceptive or based on deception; seeming plausible, but based on pretense or insincerity; deceptive; misleading; insincere; specious; as, meretricious arguments. [PJC] -- {Mer`e*tri"cious*ly}, adv. -- {Mer`e*tri"cious*ness}, n. [1913 Webster]
Synonyms of 'meretricious'
From: Moby Thesaurus
- affected,
- apparent,
- bedizened,
- beggarly,
- beneath contempt,
- big-sounding,
- blatant,
- brazen,
- brazenfaced,
- cheap,
- cheesy,
- chintzy,
- coarse,
- colorable,
- colored,
- colorful,
- common,
- contemptible,
- convoluted,
- crass,
- crude,
- crummy,
- deceptive,
- declamatory,
- delusive,
- delusory,
- despicable,
- earthy,
- elevated,
- euphuistic,
- extravagant,
- fallen,
- flagrant,
- flamboyant,
- flaming,
- flaring,
- flashy,
- flaunting,
- fulsome,
- garish,
- gaudy,
- gilded,
- gimcracky,
- glaring,
- Gongoresque,
- gorgeous,
- grandiloquent,
- grandiose,
- grandisonant,
- gross,
- harlot,
- high-flowing,
- high-flown,
- high-flying,
- high-sounding,
- highfalutin,
- hustling,
- inkhorn,
- insincere,
- Johnsonian,
- labyrinthine,
- lexiphanic,
- lofty,
- loud,
- lurid,
- magniloquent,
- mean,
- miserable,
- misleading,
- obscene,
- obtrusive,
- on the,
- on the town,
- orotund,
- ostensible,
- ostentatious,
- overdone,
- overelaborate,
- overinvolved,
- overwrought,
- paltry,
- pathetic,
- pave,
- pedantic,
- pitiable,
- pitiful,
- plausible,
- pompous,
- poor,
- pretentious,
- prostitute,
- prostituted,
- raw,
- rhetorical,
- ribald,
- rough,
- rubbishy,
- rude,
- sad,
- scarlet,
- screaming,
- scrubby,
- scruffy,
- scummy,
- scurvy,
- scuzzy,
- seeming,
- sensational,
- sensationalistic,
- sententious,
- shabby,
- shameless,
- shoddy,
- showy,
- sonorous,
- sorry,
- specious,
- spectacular,
- spurious,
- stilted,
- streetwalking,
- tall,
- tawdry,
- tinsel,
- tortuous,
- trashy,
- trumpery,
- two-for-a-cent,
- two-for-a-penny,
- twopenny,
- twopenny-halfpenny,
- valueless,
- vile,
- vulgar,
- whorish,
- worthless,
- wretched