[syn: flyblown, squalid, sordid]
4. meanly avaricious and mercenary;
- Example: "sordid avarice"
- Example: "sordid material interests"
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:
Sordid \Sor"did\, a. [L. sordidus, fr. sordere to be filthy or
dirty; probably akin to E. swart: cf. F. sordide. See
Swart, a.]
1. Filthy; foul; dirty. [Obs.]
[1913 Webster]
A sordid god; down from his hoary chin
A length of beard descends, uncombed, unclean.
--Dryden.
[1913 Webster]
2. Vile; base; gross; mean; as, vulgar, sordid mortals. "To
scorn the sordid world." --Milton.
[1913 Webster]
3. Meanly avaricious; covetous; niggardly.
[1913 Webster]
He may be old,
And yet sordid, who refuses gold. --Sir J.
Denham.
[1913 Webster]
WordNet (r) 3.0 (2006):
sordid
adj 1: morally degraded; "a seedy district"; "the seamy side of
life"; "sleazy characters hanging around casinos";
"sleazy storefronts with...dirt on the walls"- Seattle
Weekly; "the sordid details of his orgies stank under his
very nostrils"- James Joyce; "the squalid atmosphere of
intrigue and betrayal" [syn: seamy, seedy, sleazy,
sordid, squalid]
2: unethical or dishonest; "dirty police officers"; "a sordid
political campaign" [syn: dirty, sordid]
3: foul and run-down and repulsive; "a flyblown bar on the edge
of town"; "a squalid overcrowded apartment in the poorest
part of town"; "squalid living conditions"; "sordid
shantytowns" [syn: flyblown, squalid, sordid]
4: meanly avaricious and mercenary; "sordid avarice"; "sordid
material interests"
Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0:
206 Moby Thesaurus words for "sordid":
a hog for, abased, abominable, acquisitive, all-devouring, arrant,
atrocious, avaricious, avid, awful, base, beastly, beat-up,
bedraggled, beneath contempt, black, blameworthy, blowsy, blowzy,
bottomless, brutal, careless, chintzy, contemptible, corrupt,
coveting, covetous, debased, defiled, degraded, deplorable,
derogatory, despicable, deteriorated, detestable, devouring,
dilapidated, dingy, dire, dirty, discreditable, disgusting,
dishonorable, disreputable, dowdy, down-and-out, drabbletailed,
draggled, draggletailed, dreadful, egregious, enormous, esurient,
execrable, feculent, fetid, filthy, flagrant, foul, frowsy, frowzy,
frumpish, frumpy, fulsome, gluttonous, gobbling, grabby, grasping,
greedy, grievous, gross, grubby, grudging, hateful, heinous,
hoggish, horrible, horrid, ignoble, ignominious, impoverished,
impure, in rags, infamous, informal, inglorious, insanitary,
insatiable, insatiate, lamentable, limitless, loathsome, loose,
lousy, low, low-down, lumpen, maggoty, mean, mercenary, messy,
mingy, miserable, miserly, money-hungry, money-mad, monstrous,
mucky, mussy, nasty, nefarious, negligent, niggard, niggardly,
noisome, notorious, obnoxious, odious, offensive, omnivorous,
outrageous, overgreedy, parsimonious, penurious, piggish,
pinchpenny, pitiable, pitiful, poky, polluted, poor,
poverty-stricken, putrid, quenchless, ragged, raggedy, ramshackle,
rank, rapacious, ravening, ravenous, regrettable, reprehensible,
repulsive, rotten, ruinous, sad, scandalous, schlock, scraggly,
scurvy, seamy, seedy, selfish, servile, shabby, shady, shameful,
shocking, shoddy, slack, slakeless, slattern, slatternly, sleazy,
slimy, slipshod, sloppy, slovenly, slumlike, slummy, sluttish,
sodden, squalid, stingy, swinish, tacky, tattered, terrible,
too bad, tumbledown, unappeasable, unappeased, unclean, uncleanly,
unkempt, unneat, unpraiseworthy, unquenchable, unrespectable,
unsanitary, unsated, unsatisfied, unsavory, unsightly, unslakeable,
unslaked, untidy, venal, vile, villainous, voracious, woeful,
worst, worthless, wretched