Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Contemptuous \Con*temp"tu*ous\ (?; 135), a. Manifesting or expressing contempt or disdain; scornful; haughty; insolent; disdainful.
A proud, contemptuous behavior.
--Hammond.
Savage invective and contemptuous sarcasm.
--Macaulay.
Rome . . . entertained the most contemptuous opinion of
the Jews.
--Atterbury.
Syn: Scornful; insolent; haughty; disdainful; supercilious; insulting; contumelious.
Usage: Contemptuous, Contemptible. These words, from their similarity of sound, are sometimes erroneously interchanged, as when a person speaks of having ``a very contemptible opinion of another.'' Contemptible is applied to that which is the object of contempt; as, contemptible conduct; acontemptible fellow. Contemptuous is applied to that which indicates contempt; as, a contemptuous look; a contemptuous remark; contemptuous treatment. A person, or whatever is personal, as an action, an expression, a feeling, an opinion, may be either contemptuous or contemptible; a thing may be contemptible, but can not be contemptuous.
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
1590s, from Latin contemptus (see contempt). Related: Contemptuously.
Wiktionary
a. Showing contempt; expressing disdain; showing a lack of respect.
WordNet
adj. expressing extreme contempt [syn: disdainful, insulting, scornful]
Usage examples of "contemptuous".
Several of the board members were privately contemptuous of Barnett and sensed that he might be leading them down a path to disaster.
When Weston handed Kelford the list and explained that it contained names of persons taken in a raid at the Century Casino, Kelford gave the commissioner a contemptuous stare and turned back toward the billiard room.
Contemptuous eyewitnesses described her very well as looking like a tin can on a shingle or a cheesebox on a raft.
As they crowded around her Lucy Dalles peered in at the door, a contemptuous sneer on her lips.
With this purpose and a plan formed in his mind, he had returned to Fardles, to find his chauffeur struggling out of the ditch in the face of a contemptuous enemy.
Among the figures below the mountain there is a blind man, and a boy with a bad foot leading him--both good--and a contemptuous father telling the Apostles that they cannot cure his son, and that he had told them so from the first, but the paint is peeling off the figures so much that the work can hardly be judged fairly.
Generally it was believed among the contemptuous Kappas that our housemother had had no children.
The velvet vest, voluminous silken trousers, khalat and shagreen boots, gifts from a contemptuous sultan, were nowhere in evidence.
Some groups looked thoughtfully in retested Some were contemptuous of Livers willing to soil themselves with the donkey work of politics.
So the machairodus lapped and glared at them and wrinkled the bridge of its nose in a contemptuous one-sided snort, and at last withdrew into the undergrowth.
He drew out a bill, but Rimrock stood looking at him with a slow and contemptuous smile.
With a slight sneer, he pulled two bills from his pocket and slapped them on the counter with a contemptuous take-it-or-leave-it stare.
Octan circled it at a respectable distance, wings outstretched to their full metre and a half span, riding the thermals with fluid ease, contemptuous of gravity.
Ravin to Usara, shoving the still uncaring Skinny with a contemptuous boot.
When I asked him to present me at Court the insolent fool only replied with a smile, which might fairly be described as contemptuous.