audacity
/ɔːˈdasɪti
/noun [mass noun]
1A willingness to take bold risks: he whistled at the sheer audacity of the plan...
- I think the faculty was more impressed by my adventurous spirit and audacity than my celestial beauty in that performance!
- And it's ten times worse if somebody learns that I've got a website and has the sheer audacity to actually ask for the URL.
- An amazing scheme - both for it's simplicity and sheer audacity.
Synonyms
boldness, daring, fearlessness, intrepidity, bravery, courage, courageousness, valour, valorousness, heroism, pluck, recklessness;
adventurousness, enterprise, dynamism, spirit, mettle, confidence
informal guts, gutsiness, spunk, grit
British informal bottle, ballsiness
North American informal moxie, cojones, sand
vulgar slang balls
rare venturousness, temerariousness
2Rude or disrespectful behaviour; impudence: she had the audacity to suggest I’d been carrying on with him...
- Once again he was lambasted and mocked when he had the audacity to put forward a logical explanation.
- She then had the audacity to allege that I had exaggerated the truth in order to win a government grant of 750,000 to improve road safety.
- I can't believe that person actually had the audacity to say something like that.
Synonyms
impudence, impertinence, insolence, presumption, presumptuousness, forwardness, cheek, cheekiness, impoliteness, unmannerliness, bad manners, rudeness, effrontery, nerve, gall, brazenness, brashness, shamelessness, pertness, defiance, boldness, temerity
informal brass, brass neck, neck, face, cockiness
British informal sauce
Scottish informal snash
North American informal sass, sassiness, nerviness, chutzpah
informal, dated hide
British informal, dated crust
archaic malapertness
rare procacity, assumption
Origin
Late Middle English: from medieval Latin audacitas, from audax, audac- 'bold' (see audacious).