malevolent

[muh-lev-uh-luhnt]

adjective

1. wishing evil or harm to another or others; showing ill will; ill-disposed; malicious.

   His failures made him malevolent toward those who were successful.

2. evil; harmful; injurious.

   a malevolent inclination to destroy the happiness of others.

3. Astrology.,  evil or malign in influence.

malevolent

/ məˈlɛvələnt /

adjective

1. wishing or appearing to wish evil to others; malicious

2. astrology having an evil influence

Other Word Forms

• malevolence noun
• malevolently adverb
• unmalevolent adjective
• unmalevolently adverb

Word History and Origins

Origin of malevolent¹

First recorded in 1500–10; from Latin malevolent-, stem of malevolēns “ill-disposed, spiteful,” from male- male- + volēns “wanting” (present participle of velle “to want, wish for, desire”; will ¹ )

Word History and Origins

Origin of malevolent¹

C16: from Latin malevolens, from male ill + volens, present participle of velle to wish

Example Sentences

One can only wonder at the malevolent pleasure he would have felt at his Cubist masterworks ending up at the Met and not at the Tate or MoMA, which he had disdained for decades.

Read more on The Wall Street Journal

While a host of intriguing news smells ranging from fallen logs and hidden foxes delight Indy’s nose, he also senses something strange and malevolent in the house that threatens to take over Todd.

Read more on Salon

“What’s fun about Laura’s perspective is Cherry seems completely unhinged and that there’s a real malevolent undertone to her behavior,” Cooke says.

Read more on Los Angeles Times

Nothing that’s happened on any of the network’s shows in the last decade has come close to matching the unconsciously malevolent nonsense of this one-off series.

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But opining that late-night’s problems could be solved by its hosts taking up fiddling instead of calling attention to the malevolent arsonists setting fire to the nation only proves Leno hasn’t looked around much lately.

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Related Words

• malicious 
• malignant 
• murderous 
• sinister 
• vengeful 
• vicious 
• wicked