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View synonyms for grubby

grubby

1

[ gruhb-ee ]

adjective

, grub·bi·er, grub·bi·est.
  1. dirty; slovenly:

    children with grubby faces and sad eyes.

    Synonyms: bedraggled, filthy, messy, unkempt, grimy

  2. infested with or affected by grubs or larvae.
  3. contemptible:

    grubby political tricks.



grubby

2

[ gruhb-ee ]

noun

, plural grub·bies.
  1. a small sculpin, Myxocephalus aenaeus, inhabiting waters off the coast of New England.

grubby

/ ˈɡrʌbɪ /

adjective

  1. dirty; slovenly
  2. mean; beggarly
  3. infested with grubs
“Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged” 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012


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Derived Forms

  • ˈgrubbily, adverb
  • ˈgrubbiness, noun
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Other Words From

  • grubbi·ly adverb
  • grubbi·ness noun
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Word History and Origins

Origin of grubby1

First recorded in 1605–15; grub + -y 1

Origin of grubby2

Origin uncertain
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Example Sentences

For one, it’s easier to see dust and smudges on a dark surface, so you’ll be able to target those grubby fingerprints with surgical precision.

Tape and grips start out all sparkly clean but get grubby pretty quick.

There were many volumes about precocious British tots with “nannies and pony carts,” she said, but none that would appeal to “grubby neighborhood kids” like the boy before her — or to the adventure-seeking girl she had once been.

From the outside, VertiVegies looked like a handful of grubby shipping containers put side by side and drilled together.

But Paltrow and Lively insist on deep meaning besides the grubby business of trade.

Perfume bottles and weathered papyrus replicas gather dust in the grubby window displays of the empty shops.

Most of all, how could anyone film—or inflict upon viewers—such gratuitous, relentlessly grubby sexual content?

His friend to the north, Paul Kagame, is another authoritarian with grubby hands, feted nonetheless.

Before the envelope containing salacious details makes it into the grubby hands of the media, tell everything.

The cleaner-by-the-day will do the grubby things and I shall like it.

(p. 107) It was a grubby farm with not much water, but we made the best of it, and settled down for the night.

Open the bag, and turn the contents out in the lap of the dark-colored robe, grubby hands poking.

Cross the Rockies to Vancouver, and you're back among dirty walls, grubby furniture, and inadequate literature again.

It was some grubby affair that made me thank God for the sunlight.

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