Meanings
comparative more vitious · superlative most vitious
- obsoleteObsolete form of vicious.
And therefore ſo many, who are ſiniſtrous unto Good Actions, are Ambi-dexterous unto bad, and Vulcans in virtuous Paths, Achilleſes in vitious motions.
c. 1670s (date written), Thomas Brown [i.e., Thomas Browne], “Sect[ion] XX”, in John Jeffery, editor, Christian Morals, […], Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: […] [A]t the University-Press, for Cornelius Crownfield printer to the University; and are to be sold by Mr. Knapton […]; and Mr. [John] Morphew […], published 1716, →OCLC, part III, page 1092 more examples
Matter of doubt and dread suspitious, / That doth with curelesse care consume the hart, / Corrupts the stomacke with gall vitious, / Croscuts the liuer with internall smart, / And doth transfixe the soule with deathes eternall dart.
1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book III, Canto X”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLCFor our Religion where was there a more ignorant, profane, and vitious clergy, learned in nothing but the antiquitie of thir pride, thir covetouſnesſs and ſuperſtition
1649, J[ohn] Milton, chapter IX, in ΕΙΚΟΝΟΚΛΆΣΤΗΣ [Eikonoklástēs] […], London: […] Matthew Simmons, […], →OCLC, pages 79–80
Origin
- Latinvitiōsus
- Englishvitious
From Latin vitiōsus.
More words from Latin
Full word history & related roots →Cite this entry
vitious. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/vitious
“vitious.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/vitious. Accessed November 3, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “vitious,” accessed November 3, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/vitious.
Source: vitious on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.