Ponderous
['pɒnd(ə)rəs] or ['pɑndərəs]
Definition
(adj.) having great mass and weight and unwieldiness; 'a ponderous stone'; 'a ponderous burden'; 'ponderous weapons' .
(adj.) labored and dull; 'a ponderous speech' .
Typed by Belinda--From WordNet
Definition
(a.) Very heavy; weighty; as, a ponderous shield; a ponderous load; the ponderous elephant.
(a.) Important; momentous; forcible.
(a.) Heavy; dull; wanting; lightless or spirit; as, a ponderous style; a ponderous joke.
Editor: Spence
Synonyms and Synonymous
a. Heavy, weighty, massive.
Typist: Xavier
Examples
- Conscience, and honour, and the most despotic necessity dragged me apart from her, and kept me sundered with ponderous fetters. Charlotte Bronte. Shirley.
- The ponderous bolts grated into place. Edgar Rice Burroughs. The Gods of Mars.
- You must penetrate the ponderous vocabulary, the professional cant to the insight beneath or you scoff at the mountain ranges of words and phrases. Walter Lippmann. A Preface to Politics.
- Beds: Advance from the Ponderous Bedsteads of Former Times. William Henry Doolittle. Inventions in the Century.
- Then Sherlock Holmes pulled down from the shelf one of the ponderous commonplace books in which he placed his cuttings. Arthur Conan Doyle. The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes.
- In England, Wheatstone and Cooke had introduced a ponderous magnetic needle telegraph. Frank Lewis Dyer. Edison, His Life and Inventions.
- I borrowed the ponderous pistols and snapped them. Mark Twain. The Innocents Abroad.
- It is a thousand feet long and two hundred wide, all of the most symmetrical, and at the same time the most ponderous masonry. Mark Twain. The Innocents Abroad.
- The Egyptians, the Hebrews and the Chinese, and Oriental nations generally had locks and keys of ponderous size. William Henry Doolittle. Inventions in the Century.
- All eyes were fixed upon him as he stood--ponderous of frame, sonorous of voice, and with a manner which, though not graceful, was impressive. Mary Shelley. The Last Man.
- She was vast, ponderous. Charlotte Bronte. Shirley.
- This crusher consists of two ponderous upright jaws, one fixed and the other movable, between which the stones or ores to be crushed are fed. William Henry Doolittle. Inventions in the Century.
- At the head of this assembly was a ponderous, dark-looking man, whose malign eye surveyed with gloating delight the stern looks of his followers. Mary Shelley. The Last Man.
- There are ponderous archways down there, also, over which the destroying plough of prophecy passed harmless. Mark Twain. The Innocents Abroad.
- From the making of a ponderous paper car wheel to a lady's delicate work basket, success has been attained. William Henry Doolittle. Inventions in the Century.
- The very horse he backs, could not have carried the ponderous weight of King Richard through a single course. Walter Scott. Ivanhoe.
- He was now in retirement, and hence (in a ponderous white cravat, like a stiff snow-drift) was so obliging as to shade the dinner. Charles Dickens. Little Dorrit.
- Even fear could not render that ponderous body so active. William Makepeace Thackeray. Vanity Fair.
- The ponderous stone Bridge of Sighs crosses it at the second story--a bridge that is a covered tunnel --you can not be seen when you walk in it. Mark Twain. The Innocents Abroad.
- Its ponderous mass, blackened stone, and high dome, made it look, not like a temple, but a tomb. Mary Shelley. The Last Man.
Typist: Xavier