Word Meanings - TERSE - Book Publishers vocabulary database

1. Appearing as if rubbed or wiped off; rubbed; smooth; polished. Many stones, . . . although terse and smooth, have not this power attractive. Sir T. Browne. 2. Refined; accomplished; -- said of persons. "Your polite and terse gallants."

Additional info about word: TERSE

1. Appearing as if rubbed or wiped off; rubbed; smooth; polished. Many stones, . . . although terse and smooth, have not this power attractive. Sir T. Browne. 2. Refined; accomplished; -- said of persons. "Your polite and terse gallants." Massinger. 3. Elegantly concise; free of superfluous words; polished to smoothness; as, terse language; a terse style. Terse, luminous, and dignified eloquence. Macaulay. A poet, too, was there, whose verse Was tender, musical, and terse. Longfellow. Syn. -- Neat; concise; compact. Terse, Concise. Terse was defined by Johnson "cleanly written", i. e., free from blemishes, neat or smooth. Its present sense is "free from excrescences," and hence, compact, with smoothness, grace, or elegance, as in the following lones of Whitehead: - "In eight terse lines has Phædrus told (So frugal were the bards of old) A tale of goats; and closed with grace, Plan, moral, all, in that short space." It differs from concise in not implying, perhaps, quite as much condensation, but chiefly in the additional idea of "grace or elegance." -- Terse"ly, adv. -- Terse"ness, n.

Possible synonyms: (Same meaning words of TERSE)

• Concise
• Condensed
• terse
• pregnant
• expressive
• pointed
• neat
• compendious
• succinct
• summary
• brief
• short
• Epigrammatic
• Pointed
• graphic
• concise
• laconic
• Laconic
• Terse
• curt
• epigrammatic
• Pithy
• nervous
• Precise
• Definite
• exact
• nice
• accurate
• correct
• particular
• formal
• explicit
• scrupulous
• punctilious
• ceremonious

Possible antonyms: (opposite words of TERSE)

• Spare
• falsify
• corrupt

Related words: (words related to TERSE)

• FORMALITY
  The dress prescribed for any body of men, academical, municipal, or sacerdotal. The doctors attending her in their formalities as far as Shotover. Fuller. 6. That which is formal; the formal part. It unties the inward knot of marriage, . . . while
• ACCURATENESS
  The state or quality of being accurate; accuracy; exactness; nicety; precision.
• LACONIC; LACONICAL
  1. Expressing much in few words, after the manner of the Laconians or Spartans; brief and pithy; brusque; epigrammatic. In this sense laconic is the usual form. I grow laconic even beyond laconicism; for sometimes I return only yes, or
• TERSE
  1. Appearing as if rubbed or wiped off; rubbed; smooth; polished. Many stones, . . . although terse and smooth, have not this power attractive. Sir T. Browne. 2. Refined; accomplished; -- said of persons. "Your polite and terse gallants."
• EXACTOR
  One who exacts or demands by authority or right; hence, an extortioner; also, one unreasonably severe in injunctions or demands. Jer. Taylor.
• CORRECTLY
  In a correct manner; exactly; acurately; without fault or error.
• EXACTING
  Oppressive or unreasonably severe in making demands or requiring the exact fulfillment of obligations; harsh; severe. "A temper so exacting." T. Arnold -- Ex*act"ing*ly, adv. -- Ex*act"ing*ness, n.
• CORRUPTIONIST
  One who corrupts, or who upholds corruption. Sydney Smith.
• CORRUPTIBLE
  1. Capable of being made corrupt; subject to decay. "Our corruptible bodies." Hooker. Ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold. 1 Pet. i. 18. 2. Capable of being corrupted, or morally vitiated; susceptible of depravation.
• SHORT-WITED
  Having little wit; not wise; having scanty intellect or judgment.
• PREGNANT
  1. Being with young, as a female; having conceived; great with young; breeding; teeming; gravid; preparing to bring forth. 2. Heavy with important contents, significance, or issue; full of consequence or results; weighty; as, pregnant replies.
• EXACTLY
  In an exact manner; precisely according to a rule, standard, or fact; accurately; strictly; correctly; nicely. "Exactly wrought." Shak. His enemies were pleased, for he had acted exactly as their interests required. Bancroft.
• LACONIC
  Laconism. Addison.
• POINT SWITCH
  A switch made up of a rail from each track, both rails being tapered far back and connected to throw alongside the through rail of either track.
• CONDENSATIVE
  Having the property of condensing.
• POINTLESSLY
  Without point.
• SHORT CIRCUIT
  A circuit formed or closed by a conductor of relatively low resistance because shorter or of relatively great conductivity.
• POINT-DEVICE; POINT-DEVISE
  Uncommonly nice and exact; precise; particular. You are rather point-devise in your accouterments. Shak. Thus he grew up, in logic point-devise, Perfect in grammar, and in rhetoric nice. Longfellow. (more info) + point point, condition + devis
• CORRECTORY
  Containing or making correction; corrective.
• BRIEFLY
  Concisely; in few words.
• PETROGRAPHIC; PETROGRAPHICAL
  Pertaining to petrography.
• STEREOGRAPHIC; STEREOGRAPHICAL
  Made or done according to the rules of stereography; delineated on a plane; as, a stereographic chart of the earth. Stereographic projection , a method of representing the sphere in which the center of projection is taken in the surface of the
• PENTAGRAPHIC; PENTAGRAPHICAL
  Pantographic. See Pantograph.
• REFORMALIZE
  To affect reformation; to pretend to correctness.
• PHOTOGRAPHIC; PHOTOGRAPHICAL
  Of or pertaining to photography; obtained by photography; used ib photography; as a photographic picture; a photographic camera. -- Pho`to*graph"ic*al*ly, adv. Photographic printing, the process of obtaining pictures, as on chemically
• PHYTOGRAPHICAL
  Of or pertaining to phytography.
• INEXACTLY
  In a manner not exact or precise; inaccurately. R. A. Proctor.
• STEREOGRAPHICALLY
  In a stereographical manner; by delineation on a plane.
• INEXACT
  Not exact; not precisely correct or true; inaccurate.
• TRANSPARENT
  transparere to be transparent; L. trans across, through + parere to 1. Having the property of transmitting rays of light, so that bodies can be distinctly seen through; pervious to light; diaphanous; pellucid; as, transparent glass; a transparent
• COVER-POINT
  The fielder in the games of cricket and lacrosse who supports "point."
• EPIGRAPHIC; EPIGRAPHICAL
  Of or pertaining to epigraphs or to epigraphy; as, an epigraphic style; epigraphical works or studies.
• HETEROGRAPHIC
  Employing the same letters to represent different sounds in different words or syllables; -- said of methods of spelling; as, the ordinary English orthography is heterographic.