barbarous, a.
(ˈbɑːbərəs)
[f. L. barbar-us, a. Gr. βάρβαρος + -ous: preceded in use by the simple barbare, without suffix. The Gr. word had probably a primary reference to speech, and is compared with L. balbus stammering. The sense-development in ancient times was (with the Greeks) ‘foreign, non-Hellenic,’ later ‘outlandish, rude, brutal’; (with the Romans) ‘not Latin nor Greek,’ then ‘pertaining to those outside the Roman empire’; hence ‘uncivilized, uncultured,’ and later ‘non-Christian,’ whence ‘Saracen, heathen’; and generally ‘savage, rude, savagely cruel, inhuman.’ The later uses occur first in Eng., the L. and Gr. senses appearing only in translators or historians.]
1. Of language: a. orig. Not Greek; subseq. not Greek nor Latin; hence, not classical or pure (Latin or Greek), abounding in ‘barbarisms.’ Hence, b. Unpolished, without literary culture; pertaining to an illiterate people.
| 1526 Pilgr. Perf. (W. de W. 1531) 2 My wytte is grosse..and my tonge very barbarouse. 1538 Starkey England 193 To see al our law..wryten in thys barbarouse langage [i.e. old French]. 1547 Boorde Introd. Knowl. 221 Barbarouse Latin doth alter from trew Latins. 1570 R. Ascham Scholem. (1863) 71 Avoidyng barbarous ryming. 1600 J. Dymmok Treat. Irel. (1843) 47 Barbarous for the Latyn but cyuill for the sence. 1611 Cotgr., Narquois, the gibbridge, or barbarous language used among them [Gipsies]. 1612 Brinsley Lud. Lit. x. (1627) 147 Will still write false Latine, barbarous phrase. 1751 Johnson Rambl. No. 169 ¶6 From which [Latin]..the present European tongues are nothing more than barbarous degenerations. 1788 Reid Aristot. Log. iv. ii. 74 The mystery contained in the vowels of those barbarous words [Barbara, Celarent, etc.]. 1791 Cowper Iliad ii. 1063 The Carians, people of a barbarous speech. 1857 Ruskin Pol. Econ. Art 9 A wholly barbarous use of the word, barbarous in a double sense, for it is not English, and it is bad Greek. |
2. Of people: Speaking a foreign language, foreign, outlandish; orig. non-Hellenic; then, not Roman, living outside the Roman Empire; sometimes, not Christian, heathen. (Often with a glance at sense 3.)
| 1542 Udall Apoph. 285 a, Bearyng rewle emong the Barbarous, that is to weete, the Portugalles. 1543 Traheron Vigo's Wks. Gloss., The barbarous auctours vse alcohol..for moost fyne poudre. 1611 Bible Transl. Pref. 4 The Scythian counted the Athenian, whom he did not vnderstand, barbarous. ― Acts xxviii. 2 The barbarous people shewed vs no little kindnesse. 1713 Pope Windsor For. 365 Let barb'rous Ganges arm a servile train. |
3. Uncultured, uncivilized, unpolished; rude, rough, wild, savage. (Said of men, their manners, customs, products.) The usual opposite of civilized.
| 1538 Starkey England 117 A gret rudenes and a barbarouse custume usyd wyth us. 1587 Golding De Mornay viii. 96 Let vs come to Lawes, for euen the barbarousest people had of them. 1601 Shakes. Twel. N. iv. i. 52 Barbarous Caues, Where manners nere were preach'd. 1635 N. Carpenter Geog. Del. ii. xiii. 214 A barbarous and vnciuil place. 1658 R. Flecknoe Epigr. 67 Would tame fierce lions, and civilize barbarousest savages. 1780 Harris Philol. Eng. (1841) 514 Italy at the beginning of her history was barbarous. 1840 Carlyle Heroes ii. 105 An uncultured semi-barbarous son of Nature. |
4. Savage in infliction of cruelty, cruelly harsh.
| [1538 Starkey England iv. 107 Tyrannys and Barbarus pryncys.] 1588 Shakes. Tit. A. i. i. 378 Thou art a Romaine, be not barbarous. c 1620 Z. Boyd Zion's Flowers (1855) 154 This barbarous villaine did no mercy show. c 1660 Bk. Com. Prayer K. Chas. Mart., A constant meek suffering of all barbarous indignities. 1749 Fielding Tom Jones xviii. xii, It would be barbarous to part Tom and the girl. 1876 Mozley Univ. Serm. v. 111 The barbarous aspect of war. |
5. Like the speech of barbarians; harsh-sounding, rudely or coarsely noisy.
| 1645 Milton Sonn. xii, A barbarous noise environs me Of owls and cuckoos, asses, apes, and dogs. 1667 ― P.L. vii. 32 The barbarous dissonance Of Bacchus and his Revellers. 1725 De Foe Voy. round World (1840) 253 Innumerable rills..making a barbarous and unpleasant sound. 1856 Olmsted Slave States 24 The music was wild and barbarous. |
† 6. = barbaric 2. Obs.
| 1700 Dryden Pal. & Arc. iii. 65 The trappings of his horse emboss'd with barbarous gold. |