ornery

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adjective

Given to acting in opposition to others: balky, contrarious, contrary, difficult, froward, impossible, perverse, wayward. See attitude/good attitude/bad attitude/neutral attitude, support/oppose.

Origin: 1816

It was just an ordinary word. That is where ornery comes from, being a dialect or slang use of ordinary, and that is how it is used when we first meet it in Farmer Brown's journal for 1816, published later in the Maryland Historical Magazine: "The Land is old, completely worn out, the farming extremely ornary in general." But to an American, being called ordinary is hardly a compliment; in fact it is positively mean (another word meaning "ordinary"). So ornery soon developed a correspondingly negative connotation, as in this exchange from the Massachusetts Spy & Worcester County Advocate of July 28, 1830:

And in this example from Knickerbocker Magazine in 1857: "That poor ornary cuss of a red-haired, cross-eyed grocerykeeper." And from Elizabeth Custer, the widow of George Armstrong, in Tenting on the Plains (1887): "He's a good enough fellow, only he's an ornery scamp of a Republican."

By 1899 we were using orneriness too, in the sense of "the quality of being positively mean." In The Gentleman from Indiana, Booth Tarkington wrote, "Sometimes they...let loose their deviltries just for pure orneriness."

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For a list of words related to ornery, see:

• Cold, Unfriendly, Irritable, or Cruel

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See words rhyming with "ornery."

Dansk (Danish)
adj. - umedgørlig, stædig, smålig, lav, ussel

Nederlands (Dutch)
halsstarrig, onaangenaam, van slechte kwaliteit

Français (French)
adj. - (US) mesquin, méchant, revêche, entêté

Deutsch (German)
adj. - gemein, schlechtgelaunt, schwierig

Ελληνική (Greek)
adj. - (ΗΠΑ) (καθομ.) δύστροπος (κν. στριμμένος, τζαναμπέτης)

Italiano (Italian)
irascibile, irritabile, accidioso, maldisposto, eccentrico, strambo, volgare, ordinario

Português (Portuguese)
adj. - vulgar, intratável, rebelde

Русский (Russian)
подлый, упрямый, низкий

Español (Spanish)
adj. - terco, tozudo

Svenska (Swedish)
adj. - grinig, sur, envis, omedgörlig, påstridig, simpel, tarvlig

中文（简体）(Chinese (Simplified))
下等的, 故意刁难的, 低劣的

中文（繁體）(Chinese (Traditional))
adj. - 下等的, 故意刁難的, 低劣的

한국어 (Korean)
adj. - 성질이 고약한, 천한, 평범한

日本語 (Japanese)
adj. - すぐかっとなる, けんか腰の, 強情な, 平凡な, 下品な

العربيه (Arabic)
‏(صفه) مشاكس‏

עברית (Hebrew)
adj. - ‮עקשן, רע-מזג, שפל, מאיכות ירודה‬

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