prescriptive

[pri-skrip-tiv]

SEE MORE SYNONYMS FOR prescriptive ON THESAURUS.COM

adjective

that prescribes; giving directions or injunctions: a prescriptive letter from an anxious father.

depending on or arising from effective legal prescription, as a right or title established by a long unchallenged tenure.

Origin of prescriptive

1740–50; prescript + -ive, modeled on descriptive, etc.

Related formspre·scrip·tive·ly, adverbpre·scrip·tive·ness, nounnon·pre·scrip·tive, adjective

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2019

Related Words for prescriptive

accepted, authoritative, customary, prescribed, rigid, sanctioned

Examples from the Web for prescriptive

Contemporary Examples of prescriptive

The fact that some prescriptive rules are valuable does not mean that every grammatical injunction should be obeyed.
Go Ahead, End With a Preposition: Grammar Rules We All Can Live With
Nick Romeo
November 3, 2014
It was descriptive, prescriptive, and exemplary in its clarity.
Why Is Malaysia Hiding Its Report on MH370?
Clive Irving
April 28, 2014
Simmons knows she faces an uphill battle—but her goal this time around is to be prescriptive about the problem.
What Makes Mean Girls Tick
Jessica Bennett
August 12, 2011

Historical Examples of prescriptive

She has a prescriptive right to the society of the man who arrives.
American Notes
Rudyard Kipling
How or when they obtained this prescriptive right is unknown to me.
Niels Klim's journey under the ground
Baron Ludvig Holberg
The farmers have the prescriptive right of that, so we have to look to you to keep your fence in repair.
The Octopus
Frank Norris
They have a prescriptive right to enter every garden in the village.
Field and Hedgerow
Richard Jefferies
Dreams have been considered as prescriptive in various diseases.
Curiosities of Medical Experience
J. G. (John Gideon) Millingen

British Dictionary definitions for prescriptive

prescriptive

adjective

making or giving directions, rules, or injunctions

sanctioned by long-standing usage or custom

derived from or based upon legal prescriptiona prescriptive title

Derived Formsprescriptively, adverbprescriptiveness, noun

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

Word Origin and History for prescriptive

adj.

1748, from Late Latin praescriptivus, from praescript-, past participle stem of praescribere (see prescription). Or formed in English from archaic prescript "a direction" (1530s), from Latin praescriptum.