operose

American  

[op-uh-rohs] / ˈɒp əˌroʊs /

adjective

1. industrious, as a person.

2. done with or involving much labor.

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operose British  

/ ˈɒpəˌrəʊs /

adjective

1. laborious

2. industrious; busy

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Other Word Forms

• operosely adverb
• operoseness noun

Etymology

Origin of operose

First recorded in 1530–50; from Latin operōsus “busy, active,” equivalent to oper- (stem of opus ) “work” + -ōsus -ose ¹

Example Sentences

Stephens called it “dry operose quackery ... mere chaff not studied from nature, and therefore worthless, never felt, and therefore useless”.

From Nature

It seems to me a circuitous and operose way of relieving myself to put upon your community the emancipation which I ought to take on myself.

From Project Gutenberg

Nor is the ascription of existence to universality, particularity, and co-inhesion dependent on any sui generis existence of their own; for such an hypothesis is operose, requiring too many sui generis existences.

From Project Gutenberg

The common Scots saying, on the sight of anything operose and finical, “he must have had little to do that made that!” might be put as epigraph on all the song-books of old France.

From Project Gutenberg

The more curious and operose Manufactures are, the more Hands they employ; and that with the Variety of them, the Number of Workmen must still encrease, wants no Proof.

From Project Gutenberg