different between irritable vs captious

English

Etymology

Borrowed from French irritable, from Latin irritabilis

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /????t?bl/

Adjective

irritable (comparative more irritable, superlative most irritable)

1. Capable of being irritated.
2. Easily exasperated or excited.

   an irritable old man

3. (medicine) Responsive to stimuli.

Synonyms

• See also Thesaurus:irritable

Derived terms

• irritably
• irritability
• irritable bowel syndrome

Translations

Catalan

Pronunciation

• (Balearic, Central) IPA^(key): /i.ri?ta.bl?/
• (Valencian) IPA^(key): /i.ri?ta.ble/

Adjective

irritable (masculine and feminine plural irritables)

1. irritable

Related terms

• irritabilitat
• irritant
• irritar

Further reading

• “irritable” in Diccionari de la llengua catalana, segona edició, Institut d’Estudis Catalans.

Danish

Adjective

irritable

1. definite of irritabel
2. plural of irritabel

French

Adjective

irritable (plural irritables)

1. irritable

Related terms

• irritabilité
• irritant
• irriter

Further reading

• “irritable” in Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

Norwegian Bokmål

Adjective

irritable

1. definite singular of irritabel
2. plural of irritabel

Norwegian Nynorsk

Adjective

irritable

1. definite singular of irritabel
2. plural of irritabel

Spanish

Etymology

From Latin irr?t?bilis. Cognate with English irritable.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /iri?table/, [i.ri?t?a.??le]

Adjective

irritable (plural irritables)

1. irritable, cranky, testy, tetchy, prickly, snappy, snarky, irritated

Derived terms

• síndrome del intestino irritable

Related terms

• irritabilidad
• irritante
• irritar

Further reading

• “irritable” in Diccionario de la lengua española, Vigésima tercera edición, Real Academia Española, 2014.

English

Etymology

From Middle English capcious, from Middle French captieux, or its source, Latin capti?sus, from capti?.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?kæp??s/

Adjective

captious (comparative more captious, superlative most captious)

1. (obsolete) That captures; especially, (of an argument, words etc.) designed to capture or entrap in misleading arguments; sophistical.

   Synonyms: tricky, thorny, sophistical

2. Having a disposition to find fault unreasonably or to raise petty objections; cavilling, nitpicky.
   • 1968, Sidney Monas, translating Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Crime and Punishment (1866):

     But Peter Petrovich did not accept this retort. On the contrary, he became all the more captious and irritable, as though he were just hitting his stride.

   • 2009, Anne Karpf, The Guardian, 24 Jan 2009:

     The "Our Bold" column, nitpicking at errors in other periodicals, can look merely captious, and its critics often seem to be wildly and collectively wrong-headed.

   Synonyms: carping, critical, faultfinding, hypercritical, nitpicky

Derived terms

Related terms

Translations

Anagrams

• autopsic