unkempt

comparative more unkempt · superlative most unkempt · alternative obsolete uncompt

1. uncombed, dishevelled.

   He was a queer shoot, again, in his unkempt longish hair and slovenly clothes, a sort of very vulgar down-at-heel American in appearance.

   1916, D[avid] H[erbert] Lawrence, “John”, in Twilight in Italy, London: Duckworth and Co. […], →OCLC, pages 211–212

   2 more examples

   Men on cycles, lean-faced, unkempt, scorched along every country lane, shouting of unhoped deliverance, shouting to gaunt, staring figures of despair.

   1898, H.G. Wells, The War of the Worlds, London: William Heinemann, page 289

   Now, upon his whole person, from the crown of his unkempt head down to his broken, dusty boots, there yet clung that air of jaunty, devil-may-care rakishness.

   1910, Jeffery Farnol, chapter 3, in The Broad Highway

   Synonyms: dishevelled, slovenly, ragged

2. broadlyfigurativelyDisorderly; untidy; messy; not kept up.

   unkempt bedroom

   2 more examples

   And his egotism and conceit were not to be borne; and then he was both tawdry and dirty in his person; more greasily, mattedly unkempt than even a really successful pianist has any right to be, even in the best society.

   1894, George du Maurier, Trilby

   The Countess had liked Elsa from the first moment when she saw her, ragged, unkempt and forlorn, among the lowering, suspicious men-at-arms in the courtyard, and now that she knew the dangers and the privations the girl had braved for the sake of Wilhelm, the affectionate heart of Beatrix found ample room for the motherless Elsa.

   2014, Robert Barr, The Strong Arm: And Other Stories, →ISBN, page 64

3. figurativelyRough; unpolished.