ripˈroarious, a. orig. U.S.
Also -rorious.
[f. rip v.2, after uproarious.]
Boisterous, violent.
| 1830 N.Y. Constellation 11 Sept. 2/5 The English traveller had put up at a little log tavern on the banks of the Savannah, where the riproarious conduct took place. 1840 Congress Globe 2 Apr. 376/1 Here and there a gentleman from both political parties, who had been drawn out by curiosity to witness their riproarious proceedings [at the Whig ‘powwows’]. 1855 Haliburton Nature & Human N. I. 58 That's because you..never saw a riprorious hurricane in all your life. 1890 Harper's Mag. Apr. 796/2 His waning buzz of rip-roarious approbation. 1948 R. W. Chapman Lexicography 6 The Dictionary of American English..stopped at 1900, before the trickle of that rip-roarious idiom became a flood. 1975 J. I. M. Stewart Gaudy iii. 57 It was one of those rare books which, while enjoying riproarious popular success, at the same time owns sufficient intrinsic merit to achieve among the critical a kind of classic status straight away. |