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Ceremonious
Definitions
- 1 According to the required or usual ceremonies, formalities, or rituals; specifically (Christianity, obsolete), to ceremonial laws in the Bible.
"[L]et vs take a ceremonious leaue, / And louing farevvell of our ſeuerall friends."
- 2 Involving much ceremony; ostentatious, showy.
"O, the Sacrifice, / Hovv ceremonious, ſolemne, and vn-earthly / It vvas i'th' Offring?"
- 3 Of a person: fond of ceremony or ritual, or of observing strict etiquette or formality; punctilious.
"[S]ome VVriters do almoſt nothing contrary to yͤ cuſtome, and ſome by vertue of that Priuiledge, dare doe any thing. I am neither of that firſt order, nor of this laſt. The one is too fondly-ceremonious, the other too impudently audacious. I vvalke in the midſt (ſo vvell as I can) betvveene both."
- 4 Synonym of ceremonial (“of, relating to, consisting of, or used in a ceremony or rite”); formal, ritual.
"They [gentiles] may alſo theſiyer [the easier] bee allured to the Chriſtian fayth, for that it is more agreable to the lawe of nature then eyther the cerimonious lawe of Moiſes, or portentous fables of Mahometes Alcharon."
- 1 rigidly formal or bound by convention wordnet
- 2 characterized by pomp and ceremony and stately display wordnet
Etymology
Learned borrowing from Middle French cérémonieux (modern French cérémonieux) or directly from its etymon Latin caerimōniōsus + English -ous (suffix forming adjectives from nouns, denoting the presence of a quality in any degree (typically an abundance)). Caerimōniōsus is derived from Latin caerimōnia (“awe, reverence, veneration; sacredness, sanctity; religious ceremony, ritual”) (possibly ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *kʷer- (“to build, make; to do”)) + -ōsus (suffix meaning ‘full of, overly’ forming adjectives from nouns). By surface analysis, ceremony + -ous.
See also for "ceremonious"
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Unscramble this word: ceremonious