Hostile
['hɒstaɪl] or ['hɑstl]
Definition
(noun.) troops belonging to the enemy's military forces; 'the platoon ran into a pack of hostiles'.
(adj.) unsolicited and resisted by the management of the target company ( used of attempts to buy or take control of a business); 'hostile takeover'; 'hostile tender offer'; 'hostile bid' .
(adj.) not belonging to your own country's forces or those of an ally; 'hostile naval and air forces' .
(adj.) very unfavorable to life or growth; 'a hostile climate'; 'an uncongenial atmosphere'; 'an uncongenial soil'; 'the unfriendly environment at high altitudes' .
(adj.) characterized by enmity or ill will; 'a hostile nation'; 'a hostile remark'; 'hostile actions' .
(adj.) impossible to bring into friendly accord; 'hostile factions' .
Typist: Stephanie--From WordNet
Definition
(a.) Belonging or appropriate to an enemy; showing the disposition of an enemy; showing ill will and malevolence, or a desire to thwart and injure; occupied by an enemy or enemies; inimical; unfriendly; as, a hostile force; hostile intentions; a hostile country; hostile to a sudden change.
(n.) An enemy; esp., an American Indian in arms against the whites; -- commonly in the plural.
Edited by Ethelred
Synonyms and Synonymous
a. [1]. Inimical, unfriendly, warlike, at variance.[2]. Adverse, opposite, contrary, repugnant.
Typist: Preston
Definition
adj. belonging to an enemy: showing enmity: warlike: adverse.—adv. Hos′tilely.—n. Hostil′ity enmity:—pl. Hostil′ities acts of warfare.
Editor: Rodney
Examples
- It is only a hostile average-sensual-man background against which the philosophers and poets stand out. H. G. Wells. The Outline of History_Being a Plain History of Life and Mankind.
- Under the clear rays of the Arizona moon lay Powell, his body fairly bristling with the hostile arrows of the braves. Edgar Rice Burroughs. A Princess of Mars.
- But Ayesha, the favourite wife of the Prophet, had always been jealous of Fatima and hostile to Ali. H. G. Wells. The Outline of History_Being a Plain History of Life and Mankind.
- For in every state there are two hostile nations, rich and poor, which you may set one against the other. Plato. The Republic.
- Gibbon, because of his anti-Christian animus, is hostile to Constantine; but he admits that he was temperate and chaste. H. G. Wells. The Outline of History_Being a Plain History of Life and Mankind.
- In Britain, England carried on her back the Hanoverian dominions in Germany, Scotland, the profoundly alien Welsh and the hostile and Catholic Irish. H. G. Wells. The Outline of History_Being a Plain History of Life and Mankind.
- She clung to Ursula, who, through long usage was inured to this violation of a dark, uncreated, hostile world. D. H. Lawrence. Women in Love .
- We shall be interested primarily in the way nations established their civilization in spite of hostile conditions. Walter Lippmann. A Preface to Politics.
- All their training plus all their natural ossification of mind is hostile to invention. Walter Lippmann. A Preface to Politics.
- Not in a land of war and blood, surrounded by hostile neighbours, and distracted by internal factions, can Israel hope to rest during her wanderings. Walter Scott. Ivanhoe.
- As that hope failed, instinctive love of life animated me, and feelings of contention, as if a hostile will combated with mine. Mary Shelley. The Last Man.
- On entering the city the troops were fired upon by the released convicts, and possibly by deserters and hostile citizens. Ulysses S. Grant. Personal Memoirs of U. S. Grant.
- Their relations with the dwindling empire of Constantinople remained for some centuries tolerantly hostile. H. G. Wells. The Outline of History_Being a Plain History of Life and Mankind.
- His embarkation was clandestine; and if we may credit a tale of the Princess Anna, he passed the hostile sea closely secreted in a coffin. H. G. Wells. The Outline of History_Being a Plain History of Life and Mankind.
- Under such conditions, men take revenge, as it were, upon the alien and hostile environment by cultivating contempt for it, by giving it a bad name. John Dewey. Democracy and Education.
Editor: Nell