| 释义 |
unˈkempt, ppl. a.
[un-1 8 b: cf. prec. and older Flem. ongekempt.]
1. Of hair, etc.: Uncombed.
1742Shenstone Schoolmistr. ii, Oft-times [they]..For Hair unkempt..are sorely shent. 1825Ld. Cockburn Mem. (1856) 268 The bur in the throat,..the unkempt locks. 1843Carlyle Past & Pr. iii. x, It is forever indispensable for a man to fight: now with Necessity,..tangled Forests, unkempt Cotton.
b. Having the hair uncombed or dishevelled.
1748Thomson Cast. Indol. i. lxi, Unkempt, and rough, of squalid face and mein. 1812Byron Ch. Har. i. xvii, Though shent with Egypt's plague, unkempt, unwashed. 1877Black Green Past. xlv, Tall, uncouth, unkempt fellows..seated on a bench smoking.
transf.1864M. E. Braddon Doctor's Wife i, The horse had a rakish, unkempt look about the head and mane.
c. Neglected; not cared for; untrimmed; rough.
1867D. G. Mitchell Rural Stud. 1 A wild, unkempt, slatternly farm. 1879Dixon Windsor II. xx. 207 Their filthy habits and unkempt attire.
fig.1861J. Brown Horæ Subs. Ser. ii. 370 In that formidable and unkempt nature..lay the delicacy..of a gentleman.
†2. fig. Of language: Inelegant, unrefined; rude. (Cf. incompt a., uncombed ppl. a. 2.) Obs.
1579Spenser Sheph. Cal. Nov. 51 To well I wote..howe my rymes bene rugged and vnkempt. 1590― F.Q. iii. x. 29 Thy offers base I greatly loth, And eke thy words vncourteous and vnkempt. 1606N. Baxter Sidney's Ourania D 2 Our Spokes beene blunt,..Vnable in Mysteries to know the sooth; Vnkempt, vnpolished, ignorant, lewde.
Hence unˈkemptness.
1876World V. 16 Untidyness and unkemptness [of a garden]. 1900Scribner's Mag. Sept. 297/2 The foul unkemptness of the natives. |