Meanings
comparative more disputatious · superlative most disputatious
- Inclined to argue or debate; provoking debate.
Certainly there have been bitterly contested elections in this country before. Party spirit is always rife, and in such vivid, excitable, disputatious communities as ours are, and I trust always will be, it is the very soul of freedom.
1868 October 20, John Lothrop Motley, Four Questions for the People, at the Presidential Election: Address of John Lothrop Motley, before the Parker Fraternity, at the Music Hall, October 20, 1868, Boston, Mass.: Ticknor and Fields, →OCLC, page 41 more example
He was followed by a disputatious gentleman, who had the temerity to maintain before the royal misocapnist (the Counterblast had not as yet issued from the monarch's lips, but his anti-nicotian prejudices were well known,) the thesis, that "tobacco must needs be good;" proceeding to his proof "by enumeration or induction, because Kings, Princes, Nobles, Earles, Lords, Knights, Gentlemen of all Countries and Nations, reckoning a number, loved it."
1864, “Visit of King James to Oxford in 1605: Tobacologia: Date of ‘Macbeth’”, in Notes and Queries, page 301Synonyms: argumentative, contentious, quarrelsome, agonistic, argumentative, bangsome, bellicose, belligerent · Antonyms: conciliatory, pacific, peaceable
Synonyms & antonyms
adjectiveInclined to argue or debate; provoking debate.
More synonyms by meaning
adjectiveinclined or showing an inclination to dispute or disagree, even to engage in law suits
Synonym sets from Open English WordNet, CC BY 4.0.
Origin
From disputation, equivalent to disputati(on) + -ous.
Full word history & related roots →Translations
German umstritten, bestritten
- umstrittenrelating to something that is in question
- bestrittenrelating to something that is in question
- kontroversrelating to something that is in question
- strittigrelating to something that is in question
- streitbarinclined to argue; provoking debate
- streitsüchtiginclined to argue; provoking debate
Latin contentiōsus
- contentiōsusinclined to argue; provoking debate
Scottish Gaelic connsachail, connspaideach
- connsachailinclined to argue; provoking debate
- connspaideachinclined to argue; provoking debate
Turkish dalaşkan, kavgacı
- dalaşkaninclined to argue; provoking debate
- kavgacıinclined to argue; provoking debate
Cite this entry
disputatious. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 2, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/disputatious
“disputatious.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/disputatious. Accessed November 2, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “disputatious,” accessed November 2, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/disputatious.
Source: disputatious on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.