Word.ws English Dictionary

countersenses

countersenses is the plural of countersense.

Meaning of countersense

Noun

countersense (countable and uncountable, plural countersenses)

  1. An opposite meaning.
    • Moreover, I find there are ſome Words now in French which are turn'd to a counterſenſe, as we uſe the Dutch Word Crank in Engliſh to be well-diſpos'd, which in the Original ſignifieth to be ſick; ſo in French, Cocu is taken for one whoſe Wife is light, and hath made him a paſſive Cuckold; whereas...c. 1645, James Howell, “XIX. To the R.H. the Earl of Clare.”, in Epistolæ Ho-Elianæ. Familiar Letters Domestic and Forren. […], 3rd edition, volume IV, London: […] Humphrey Mos[e]ley, […], published...
  2. A nonsensical idea; a contradiction in terms; something that contradicts an established principle, architectural or musical style, etc.
    • On that line we reach simply the old countersense: "All is Reality" is as meaningless a proposition as "All is Illusion."1905, J. M. Robertson, chapter IV, in Letters on Reasoning, page 225

Questions about countersenses

What is countersenses the plural of?
Countersenses is the plural of countersense.

Words near countersenses in the dictionary

  1. counterselections
  2. counterselective
  3. counterselects
  4. countersemitism
  5. countersense
  6. countersenses
  7. countersful
  8. countershaded
  9. countershading
  10. countershadings
  11. countershaft

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: countersenses (page history and authors); countersense (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Cite this entry: “countersenses.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/countersenses. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.