unprepossessing
Britishadjective
Explanation
If you find someone to be unprepossessing, you find them unattractive. Not that they're ugly, mind you! Just unprepossessing. Unprepossessing is a rather indirect way of calling someone unattractive, or at best OK-looking. Unprepossessing is not quite the same as "ugly." Rather, just a way of saying that someone's looks aren't what you're most likely to remember about them. Cinderella was most unprepossessing in the filthy clothes and worn-out shoes that her step-sisters forced her to wear. But when she was all decked out by her fairy godmother, she was the belle of the ball: she was no longer unprepossessing.
Vocabulary lists containing unprepossessing
100 SAT Words Beginning with "U"
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Murder on the Orient Express
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The Count of Monte Cristo
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Unprepossessing as most of the colliers' homes were, Lowrie's cottage was a trifle less inviting than the majority.
From That Lass O' Lowrie's 1877 by Burnett, Frances Hodgson
Unprepossessing he might be, but he was in no sense formidable.
From The Swindler and Other Stories by Dell, Ethel M. (Ethel May)
Unprepossessing, un-prē-po-zes′ing, adj. not predisposing in one's favour, unpleasing.—adj.
From Chambers's Twentieth Century Dictionary (part 4 of 4: S-Z and supplements) by Various
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
