different between barbarous vs boisterous

English

Alternative forms

• (obsolete) barbarouse

Etymology

Late Middle English, from Latin barbarus (“foreigner, savage”), from Ancient Greek ???????? (bárbaros, “foreign, strange”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?b??(?)b???s/

Adjective

barbarous (comparative more barbarous, superlative most barbarous)

1. (said of language) Not classical or pure.
2. uncivilized, uncultured
   • 1923, Walter de la Mare, Seaton's Aunt

     I felt vaguely he was a sneak, and remained quite unmollified by advances on his side, which, in a boy's barbarous fashion, unless it suited me to be magnanimous, I haughtily ignored.

3. Like a barbarian, especially in sound; noisy, dissonant.

   I did but prompt the age to quit their cloggs

   By the known rules of antient libertie,

   When strait a barbarous noise environs me

   Of Owles and Cuckoes, Asses, Apes and Doggs - I did but prompt the age to quit their cloggs, John Milton (1673)

Derived terms

• barbarously
• barbarousness

Related terms

• barbarian
• barbaric

Translations

English

Etymology

From Middle English boistres, an alteration of Middle English boistous, from Anglo-Norman bustous (“rough”), perhaps from Old French boitous (“noisy”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?b??st???s/

Adjective

boisterous (comparative more boisterous, superlative most boisterous)

1. Full of energy; exuberant; noisy.
2. Characterized by violence and agitation; wild; stormy.
3. Having or resembling animal exuberance.

Derived terms

• boisterously
• boisterousness

Translations