contrariety

American  

[kon-truh-rahy-i-tee] / ˌkɒn trəˈraɪ ɪ ti /

noun

contrarieties plural

1. the quality or state of being contrary.

2. something contrary or of opposite character; a contrary fact or statement.

3. Logic. the relation between contraries.

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contrariety British  

/ ˌkɒntrəˈraɪətɪ /

noun

1. opposition between one thing and another; disagreement

2. an instance of such opposition; inconsistency; discrepancy

3. logic the relationship between two contraries

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Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• noncontrariety
  noun

Inflected Forms

Nouns

• contrarieties
  plural

Etymology

Origin of contrariety

1350–1400; Middle English contrariete (< Anglo-French ) < Late Latin contrārietās. See contrary, -ity

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

contrariety contrarieties

But Isidorito, contrary to what might have been believed, considering his vast legal attainments and his gravity no less vast, met with a slight contrariety in his love-making.

From The Marquis of Pe?alta (Marta y Mar?a) A Realistic Social Novel by Palacio Vald?s, Armando

He had an inexhaustible fund of good humour, and was not even angry when Pete, in sheer contrariety, told him the reason for his enticement to the still.

From The Prophet of the Great Smoky Mountains by Murfree, Mary Noailles

She did know the longing, the discontent, the universal contradiction and contrariety which is involved in that condition of unfulfilment to which so many grey and undeveloped lives are condemned.

From Women Novelists of Queen Victoria's Reign A Book of Appreciations by Alexander, Mrs.

In opposition to, whether the opposition is of sentiment or of action; on the other side; counter to; in contrariety to; hence, adverse to; as, against reason; against law; to run a race against time.

From Webster's Unabridged Dictionary by Webster, Noah

And yet, at the same moment, with a contrariety of feeling from which he shrank aghast, there was skulking into his mind all that grewsome company of doubts.

From The Prophet of the Great Smoky Mountains by Murfree, Mary Noailles

With Martin, who has just been released after serving a prison term, Ayme takes a dreamlike but invigorating stroll through the contrarieties of Western society.

From Time Magazine Archive

But he was much more; as Louis Kronenberger points out in his introduction to this handy Portable, Boswell was both a kind of genius and "a tissue of contrarieties."

From Time Magazine Archive

Mr. Sharpe shook his head as if to clear it of contrarieties.

From "The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation, Volume I: The Pox Party" by M.T. Anderson

First, Valentine made Michal tell him of all the horrors she had gone through, and what desperate suffering she had endured, and then he related to her the many contrarieties which had befallen himself.

From Pretty Michal by Jókai, Mór

“Archie,” he said, “in this land of contrarieties does the moon sometimes rise in the south?”

From From Squire to Squatter A Tale of the Old Land and the New by Stables, Gordon