contrariety
/kɒntɹəˈɹʌɪəti/
contrariety means opposition or contrariness; cross-purposes, marked contrast. It carries an Arena rating of 1643, earned across 27 head-to-head judged battles.
Among words judged in Lexicurio's Arena, contrariety ranks #2,588 of 17,134 for Most Malleable Words, #2,954 of 17,128 for Most Ponderous Words, #3,918 of 17,138 for Most Incisive Words, #4,763 of 17,127 for Words That Escaped Their Books.
contrariety is pronounced /kɒntɹəˈɹʌɪəti/.
Why “contrariety” is a great word
CONTRARIETY — [Noun] The state or quality of being in direct opposition or marked contrast. From Middle French contrariété, from Late Latin contrarietas ("opposition"), from Latin contrarius ("opposite, contrary"), from contra ("against"). Unlike "contrast," which emphasizes a juxtaposition of differences for comparison, or "contrariness," which implies a willful, perverse temperament, contrariety denotes the formal, inherent state of diametric opposition. It is the magnetic repulsion of identical poles, the silence that follows a slammed door, and the immutable fact that for every "yes" there exists a "no" of equal force—the structural tension upon which all argument, and perhaps all thought, depends.
Etymology
Borrowed from Middle French contrariété, from Late Latin contrarietas, from contrarius, from Latin contra (“against”). By surface analysis, contrary + -ety.
noun
- Opposition or contrariness; cross-purposes, marked contrast.e.g.“What differences of sense and reason, what contrarietie of imaginations doth the diversitie of our passions present unto us?” — 1603, Michel de Montaigne, chapter XII, in John Florio, transl., The Essayes […], book II, London: […] Val[entine] Simmes for Edward Blount […], →OCLC:
Definitions & examples from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 3.0).
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