☼ Concept Map

''uncouth'' ▫ᴱᴺ｜Definition｜1st｜20260723122144-00-⌔

uncouth - Wiktionary, the free dictionary

English

Adjective

uncouth (comparativeuncouther or more uncouth, superlativeuncouthest or most uncouth)

  • (archaic) Unfamiliar, strange, foreign.
    • ✤ Synonyms: alien, uncanny, weird, fremd; see also Thesaurus: strange
    • ✤ Antonym: (obsolete) couth
    • ✤ If this ** uncouth*
      forest yield anything savage, I will either be food for it or
      bring it for food to thee.*1
    • ✤ The trouble of thy thoughts this night in sleep
      Affects me equally; nor can I like
      This uncouth’ dream, of evil sprung I fear […]      2
    • ✤ There was a delicious sensation of mingled security and awe with which I looked down, from my giddy height, on the monsters of the deep at their uncouth gambols.3
  • Clumsy, awkward.
    • ✤ Synonyms: bumbling, inept
  • Unrefined, crude.
    • ✤ Synonyms: bumptious, churlish, uncivil; see also Thesaurus: impolite
    • ✤ Antonym: couth
    • ✤ I don’t want to associate with uncouth people.
    • ✤ Harsh words, though pertinent, uncouth appear:/None please the fancy, who offend the ear.4
    • ✤ If Yule found it delightful, why did Kipling find it uncouth?5
    • ✤ “I don’t think it’s uncouth to talk about it. I think it’s a reality that has to inform the urgency with which we approach those issues.”6

Etymology

From Middle English uncouth, from Old English uncūþ (“unknown; unfamiliar; strange”), from Proto-West Germanic ﹡unkunþ, from Proto-Germanic ﹡unkunþaz (“unknown”), equivalent to un- +‎ couth. The modern pronunciation does not show/aʊ/, the usual development of the Middle English vowel from the Great Vowel Shift. It is usually explained as a pronunciation taken from Northern English dialects, which did not undergo the diphthongization of the vowel.

Pronunciation

  • IPA: /ʌnˈkuːθ/
  • Audio: 🔊
    • ✤ Rhymes: -uːθ

Printed 2026-07-23.

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Footnotes

  1. c. 1598–1600 (date written), William Shakespeare, “As You Like It”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene vi], lines 882-94: ↩

  2. 1667, John Milton, “Book V”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a] nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a] nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC: ↩

  3. 1819 June 23, Geoffrey Crayon [pseudonym; Washington Irving], “The Voyage”, in The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent., number I, New York, N.Y.: […] C[ornelius] S. Van Winkle, […], →OCLC, page 14: ↩

  4. 1699, Samuel Garth, The Dispensary, Canto IV, line 204: ↩

  5. 2014, James Lambert, “A Much Tortured Expression: A New Look At `Hobson-Jobson’”, in International Journal of Lexicography, volume 27, number 1, page 58: ↩

  6. 2021 May 10, Ian Prasad Philbrick, quoting Brian Fallon, “‘We May Not Have a Full Two Years’: Democrats’ Plans Hinge on Good Health”, in The New York Times ‎, →ISSN: ↩