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Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
incautious
adjective
EXAMPLES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
Incautious investors may lose money.
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ An incautious word, I felt, could spark off resentment.
▪ Discretion however was overridden by an enormous but incautious curiosity.
▪ I was merely somewhat incautious at one point.
▪ It is incautious, ill-advised, is it not?
▪ Stretching out an incautious hand he burnt a finger on one of the bars.
▪ The earl's daughter, Dorothea, seems to have inherited her father's somewhat incautious nature.
▪ The role of the government agencies in predator control, after an incautious start, has been more or less responsible.
▪ What these qualities were Furse was never so vulgar or incautious as to define.
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Incautious

Incautious \In*cau"tious\, a. [Pref. in- not + cautious: cf. L. incautus.] Not cautious; not circumspect; not attending to the circumstances on which safety and interest depend; heedless; careless; as, an incautious step; an incautious remark.

You . . . incautious tread On fire with faithless embers overspread.
--Francis.

His rhetorical expressions may easily captivate any incautious reader.
--Keill.

Syn: Unwary; indiscreet; inconsiderate; imprudent; impolitic; careless; heedless; thoughtless. -- In*cau"tious*ly, adv. -- In*cau"tious*ness, n.

Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
incautious

1703, from in- (1) + cautious. Related: Incautiously.

Wiktionary
incautious

a. careless, reckless, not exercising proper caution

WordNet
incautious
  1. adj. lacking in caution; "an incautious remark"; "incautious talk" [ant: cautious]

  2. without out proper caution; "an incautious step sent her headlong down the stairs"

  3. displaying or feeling no wariness; "an unguarded remark"; "spilled the beans in an incautious moment" [syn: unguarded]

Usage examples of "incautious".

Gord must have seemed not to have been alert as he quickly appraised what was happening to his fellows, for the blue-eyed foeman launched an incautious rush that not only missed its mark but enabled Gord to deliver a vicious set of counterattacks.

A big snake like Samm would readily and easily have made a quick meal of an incautious quoll, sharp teeth and uncommon energy notwithstanding.

But how were we to be cautious when Prudence Vizard was so determinedly incautious?

There was talk, apparently, of a rival paper setting up, this to support the Whiggish agenda, with its incautious talk of tyranny and the overthrow of the King.

Raiding parties of the Gora would lie in wait for incautious individuals, or occasionally make daring night raids into our homes.

CAMINESI winced as an incautious movement jarred his bandaged arm and shoulder, and stopped trying to pry the power pack away from the nonstandard mounting.

The tillerman on the second barge ducks, but some of the incautious levies who thought the first wires were the only wires are slashed by the recoiling wire whip.

By this their doctors are guided in the performance of acupuncture, marking the safe places to thrust in needles, as we buoy out our ship-channels, and doubtless indicating to learned eyes the spots where incautious meddling had led to those little accidents of shipwreck to which patients are unfortunately liable.

Collis and Alanna Brooks, and the two of them were incautious enough to sign undertakings to take part in the premiere.

The senior biosciences officer was buried in her office with Dahak, trying to make sense of her instrument readings and snarling at any soul incautious enough to disturb her.

The Italians are doing their best to revive the classical place-names, where they have been lost, and occasionally the incautious traveller is much misled.

The hawk is scouting the rim of the red mesa for incautious rodents.

A start, a fidgety shifting of the position, yes, even a violent sneeze, has been known before now to prove fatal to the incautious, and to nip in the bud many a promising friendship.

He was drunk not from a few incautious tots earlier, but because he had long ago reached the stage where he needed a tot an hour to get through the day, just as a ship could only get to windward by tacking.

What such greedy and incautious folk as these may awaken if they venture up the Rain Wild River, I do not like to think.