English Explanatory Dictionary

ingenious

English dictionary entry

Meanings

adj
  1. Of a person, displaying genius or brilliance; inventive.
  2. Of a thing, characterized by genius; cleverly contrived or done.
  3. Showing originality or sagacity; witty.

Pronunciation

/ɪnˈd͡ʒiːnjəs/ /ɪnˈd͡ʒiːni.əs/ en-us-ingenious.ogg

Word forms

ingenious more ingenious most ingenious engenious

Etymology

Borrowed from Middle French ingénieux, from Old French engenious, from Latin ingeniōsus (“endowed with good natural capacity, gifted with genius”), from ingenium (“innate or natural quality, natural capacity, genius”), from in- (“in”) + gignere (“to produce”), Old Latin genere. See also engine.

Synonyms

astute brainy bright brilliant clever educated genius gifted ingenious intellectual intelligent keen knowledgeable piquant quick quick on the uptake quick-witted rational sagacious savvy scholared sharp smart talented whip-smart wise artful adroit shrewd witty amusing diverting droll entertaining humorous jocose jocular quick on the draw tongue-in-cheek

Related words

engine engineer genius ingeniosity ingeniousness

Derived words

hyperingenious ingeniously overingenious superingenious ultraingenious uningenious
This entry uses open data from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA/GFDL). Word forms are used for search and are not indexed as separate pages.
Back to search All on I Russian dictionary Dahl dictionary