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unmerciful

[uhn-mur-si-fuh l]
adjective
  1. merciless; relentless; severe; cruel; pitiless.
  2. unsparingly great, extreme, or excessive, as amounts: to talk for an unmerciful length of time.
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Origin of unmerciful

First recorded in 1475–85; un-1 + merciful
Related formsun·mer·ci·ful·ly, adverbun·mer·ci·ful·ness, noun
Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018

Examples from the Web for unmercifully

Historical Examples

  • It was received with great applause, and I was unmercifully chaffed.

    Brighter Britain! (Volume 1 of 2)

    William Delisle Hay

  • They were swarming all over us, and how unmercifully they did guy us!

    War from the Inside

    Frederick L. (Frederick Lyman) Hitchcock

  • His whole weight hangs in them—they'll cut him unmercifully.

    Disowned

    Victor Endersby

  • It was no easy task, the full pails tugging most unmercifully at his arms.

  • You are just the kind of a man that women fool most unmercifully.

British Dictionary definitions for unmercifully

unmerciful

adjective
  1. showing no mercy; relentless
  2. extreme or excessive
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Derived Formsunmercifully, adverbunmercifulness, 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 unmercifully

unmerciful

adj.

late 15c., from un- (1) "not" + merciful. Related: Unmercifully.

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Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper