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What is "ignoble"

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ignoble
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
ignoble
adjective
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ Can my hon. and diplomatic Friend assure us that these important diplomatic communications were not ultimately put to any ignoble use?
▪ Of course it is irksome to have to persuade one's fellow states, many of which act out of ignoble motives.
▪ She saved her fury for the ignoble dead.
▪ The decision to fall into line was not made for ignoble reasons, but from financial necessity.
▪ Their vision, for all its limits, was not ignoble.
▪ With its own ignoble voice, blood does, indeed, cry out for blood.
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Ignoble

Ignoble \Ig*no"ble\, v. t. To make ignoble. [Obs.]
--Bacon.

Ignoble

Ignoble \Ig*no"ble\, a. [L. ignobilis; pref. in- not + nobilis noble: cf. F. ignoble. See In- not, and Noble, a.]

  1. Of low birth or family; not noble; not illustrious; plebeian; common; humble.

    I was not ignoble of descent.
    --Shak.

    Her royal stock graft with ignoble plants.
    --Shak.

  2. Not honorable, elevated, or generous; base.

    'T is but a base, ignoble mind, That mounts no higher than a bird can soar.
    --Shak.

    Far from the madding crowd's ignoble strife.
    --Gray.

  3. (Zo["o]l.) Not a true or noble falcon; -- said of certain hawks, as the goshawk.

    Syn: Degenerate; degraded; mean; base; dishonorable; reproachful; disgraceful; shameful; scandalous; infamous.

Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
ignoble

mid-15c., "of low birth," from Middle French ignoble, from Latin ignobilis "unknown, undistinguished, obscure; of base birth, not noble," from assimilated form of in- "not, opposite of" (see in- (1)) + gnobilis "well-known, famous, renowned, of superior birth" (see noble). Related: Ignobly.

Wiktionary
ignoble

a. 1 Not noble; plebeian; common. 2 Not honorable; base. 3 Not a true or "noble" falcon; said of certain hawks, such as the goshawk.

WordNet
ignoble

  1. adj. completely lacking nobility in character or quality or purpose; "something cowardly and ignoble in his attitude"; "I think it a less evil that some criminals should escape than that the government should play an ignoble part"- Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. [ant: noble]

  2. not of the nobility; "of ignoble (or ungentle) birth"; "untitled civilians" [syn: ungentle, untitled]

Usage examples of "ignoble".

And if to be loosed from sin and shame, by means however abrupt, be not liberty of the most exalted, spiritual kind, then, young man, you are a bondslave indeed, to your own ignoble desires.

After some very interesting exchanges of reminiscences about incurable millers, roarers, lungers, half-bred blood-cattle, gingers, and slugs, which led inevitably to still more interesting stories of the chase, during the course of which both gentlemen found themselves perfectly in accord in their contempt of such ignoble persons as roadsters and skirters, and their conviction that the soundest of all maxims was, Get over the ground if it breaks your neck, formality was at an end between them, and his lordship was not only begging Bertram to call him Chuffy, as everyone else did, but promising to show him some of the rarer sights in town.

Instead of ignoble death and defeat this day, our sons and allies are but hours away from seeing the head of our enemy, Agamemnon, lifted high on a spike, while our Thracians and Trojans and Pelasgians and Cicones and Paeonians and Paphlagonians and Halizonians have lived to watch the end of this long war at last, and soon will be raking up the gold of defeated Argives, soon will be sweeping up the well-earned armor of Agamemnon and his men.

You cringing parasite on the underside of a dwarfish and ignoble worm!

From a thousand schemes for revenge he had chosen the most frightful and ignoble that a brain maddened and enfevered by hatred could possibly conceive.

A Venetian nobleman, noble by birth, but very ignoble in his propensities, called Sgombro, and belonging to the Gritti family, fell deeply in love with him, and Croce, either for fun or from taste, shewed himself very compliant.

This Demos, I have heard, has in his wrist A pulse that no two doctors have as yet Counted and found the same, and in his mouth A tongue that has the like alacrity For saying or not for saying what most it is That pullulates in his ignoble mind.

The Marches got no splendor for the two prices they paid, and their approach to their hotel on Unter den Linden was as unimpressive as the ignoble avenue itself.

I could almost reconstruct the ignoble pidgin-splutter in which Ching Po had told Stires, and was even now telling Follet.

I have longed for some better object of worship than the trifler of fashion, or the yet more ignoble minion of the senses.

Old Harrovians wrote to the papers, saying that they had been at Harrow for six years, and that the conversation was, except in a few ignoble exceptions, pure and manly, and that the general atmosphere was one of clean, healthy broadmindedness.

Freemasonry is continual effort to exalt the nobler nature over the ignoble, the spiritual over the material, the divine in man over the human.

Masonry is continual effort to exalt the nobler nature over the ignoble, 813-m.

Instead of ignoble death and defeat this day, our sons and allies are but hours away from seeing the head of our enemy, Agamemnon, lifted high on a spike, while our Thracians and Trojans and Pelasgians and Cicones and Paeonians and Paphlagonians and Halizonians have lived to watch the end of this long war at last, and soon will be raking up the gold of defeated Argives, soon will be sweeping up the well-earned armor of Agamemnon and his men.

Her scientific curiosity would lead her back to the rained city, where she would be certain to suffer the same ignoble fate that had befallen him.