1425–75; late Middle English; after Sir Henry Percy, to whom it was applied as a nickname
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
More significant men of his time can be discussed without passion because they are inextricably woven into a tapestry of the past, but this hotspur refuses to die.
From Reuters • Jan. 11, 2013
“You try telling that hotspur Phaeton why he was reined in, or rosy-fingered Aurora why I had to shove her in the face,” Hermes archly tells the reader.
From New York Times • Apr. 4, 2010
Libyan Leader Muammar Gaddafi, the hotspur of the Arab world, barged into the internal problems of another nation for the second time in two weeks.
From Time Magazine Archive
His extraordinary behavior, manifested in a supreme disregard for social etiquette, won for him the sobriquet of "the hotspur of Europe," and the conviction that he was mad.
From Time Magazine Archive
The two Georgia brigades, a Mississippi brigade, and a South Carolina brigade, composed mostly of the first volunteers from their respective States, needed as a commander a hotspur like our own J.B.
From History of Kershaw's Brigade by Dickert, D. Augustus
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.
