adjective
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having or characterized by robust health
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strong or invigorating
a lusty brew
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lustful
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of lusty
Middle English word dating back to 1175–1225; see origin at lust, -y 1
Explanation
Someone who's lusty is healthy and passionate. A lusty young farm worker is strong and energetic, tackling each new challenge enthusiastically. You can be lusty in love, yearning for or infatuated with another person. You can also be lusty for life, filled with great strength and eager to live each day to the fullest. As time has gone by, lust and lusty have gained the "full of desire" meaning and lost some of the thirteenth century "joyful" sense of the words.
Vocabulary lists containing lusty
"Of Plymouth Plantation," Vocabulary from the historical account
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"The Tempest," Vocabulary from Acts 1 and 2
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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.
See Examples For:
It’s easy to get lost in its layers of strings, to chase a cello’s lusty glide past innocent piano notes.
From Salon ● Oct. 23, 2026
There were giant empty spaces in the stands at Hampden but, at the end, there were enough fans left behind to deliver a lusty verdict on what they saw.
From BBC ● Oct. 6, 2026
Fans who had previously been happy cheering wins with lusty renditions of “Sweet Caroline” don’t mind that it has been shoved aside.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 11, 2026
By the end of the two-hour hike that evening, three lusty male tarantulas had been spotted.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 12, 2023
Isabel lays in my aims a tiny boy, gasping his own first breaths with lusty cries.
From "Ophelia" by Lisa Klein
Its cuisine is arguably less sophisticated than Provence’s, and yet it is more firmly rooted in the land it sprang from, and it is, I put to you, enjoyed with lustier abandon.
From New York Times ● Mar. 15, 2017
Heartthrob invokes somber, marble notebook dumps as truthfully as it portrays its lustier foil.
From Time ● Feb. 1, 2013
Its mannered, delicate style seemed so ill-suited to the topic that young Hu dashed off some lustier lines of his own.
From Time Magazine Archive
But aside from its lustier detonations, it is pretty much the same show.
From Time Magazine Archive
The Germans sang lustier and more voices came in until they killed the parody even as they had killed “Auld Lang Syne.”
From "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn" by Betty Smith
A year after the loudest and lustiest of the four Grand Slam tennis tournaments was played amid eerie silence and empty seats, the U.S.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 28, 2021
The Blony process and Gum, Inc., are both creations of one of Philadelphia's lustiest characters, burly, brown-eyed Jacob Warren Bowman, whose business adventures have been many and remarkable.
From Time Magazine Archive
Today they are one of the Navy's most vital, loudest and lustiest outfits.
From Time Magazine Archive
The collection was the achievement of a lifetime of picture-buying by one of Philadelphia's lustiest characters, the late, great corporation lawyer John G. Johnson.
From Time Magazine Archive
The season began to invite the lustiest to hunting.
From Voyages of Peter Esprit Radisson by Pierre Esprit Radisson
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Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
