ASPERITY

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does asperity mean? 

• ASPERITY (noun)
  The noun ASPERITY has 2 senses:

1. something hard to endure

2. harshness of manner

  Familiarity information: ASPERITY used as a noun is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• ASPERITY (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Something hard to endure

Classified under:

Nouns denoting attributes of people and objects

Synonyms:

asperity; grimness; hardship; rigor; rigorousness; rigour; rigourousness; severeness; severity

Context example:

the asperity of northern winters

Hypernyms ("asperity" is a kind of...):

difficultness; difficulty (the quality of being difficult)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "asperity"):

sternness (the quality (as of scenery) being grim and gloomy and forbidding)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Harshness of manner

Classified under:

Nouns denoting attributes of people and objects

Synonyms:

asperity; sharpness

Hypernyms ("asperity" is a kind of...):

ill nature (a disagreeable, irritable, or malevolent disposition)

 Context examples 

“Oh, if you find your own cases more interesting than mine—” said Holmes, with some asperity.

(The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

“I don’t admit that a fresh illustration is an explanation,” said I with some asperity.

(His Last Bow, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Three years had certainly not smoothed the asperities of his temper or his impatience with a less active intelligence than his own.

(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

"Mr. Ford has already explained the situation," he said with asperity.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

Not Harriet's equal! exclaimed Mr. Knightley loudly and warmly; and with calmer asperity, added, a few moments afterwards, No, he is not her equal indeed, for he is as much her superior in sense as in situation.

(Emma, by Jane Austen)

Soft scene, daring demonstration, I would not have; and I stood in peril of both: a weapon of defence must be prepared—I whetted my tongue: as he reached me, I asked with asperity, whom he was going to marry now?

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

But he was set right there by Mrs. Bennet, who assured him with some asperity that they were very well able to keep a good cook, and that her daughters had nothing to do in the kitchen.

(Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen)

“Do you see any prospect of solving this mystery, Mr. Holmes?” she asked, with a touch of asperity in her voice.

(The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)