Word.ws English Dictionary

obtuse

Syllables: ob·tuseUK/əbˈtjuːs//əbˈt(j)us/

obtuse adjective: blunt; not sharp, pointed, or acute in form.

obtuse: blunt; not sharp, pointed, or acute in form
Image: Lfahlberg, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Adjective

obtuse (comparative obtuser or more obtuse, superlative obtusest or most obtuse)

  1. Blunt; not sharp, pointed, or acute in form.
    • For we see a Feather or a Rush drawn along the Lip or Cheek, doth tickle; whereas a thing more obtuse, or a touch more hard, doth not.1670, Francis Lord Verulam, Viscount St. Alban [Francis Bacon], “Century VIII”, in Sylva Sylvarum, or, A Natural History, in Ten Centuries: Whereunto is Newly Added, the History Natural and...
    • See then the quiver broken and decay'd, / In which are kept our arrows! Rusting there / In wild disorder, and unfit for use, / […] Their points obtuse, and feathers drunk with wine!1817, William Cowper, The Task, London: John Sharpe, page 58
    1. Blunt, or rounded at the extremity.
      • The Herb Pantagruelion hath a little Root somewhat hard and ruff, roundish, terminating in an obtuse and very blunt Point, and having some of its Veins, Strings or Filaments coloured with some spots of white, […]1653, Francis Rabelais [i.e., François Rabelais]; [Peter Anthony Motteux, transl.], “How Pantagruel Did Put Himself in a Readiness to Go to Sea; and of the Herb Named Pantagruelion”, in The Works of...
    2. (specifically) Larger than one, and smaller than two right angles, equivalently more than 90° and less than 180°.
      • If you put foure Spleets in a Hiue, then cut their backes, where they must leane one against another, to square angles, such as be foure in a circle: if but three, cut them to obtuse angles, such as are three in a circle: (you may readily try them, before you put them in, by Moulds made iust to...1623, Charles Butler, “Of the Hiues, and the Dressing of Them”, in The Feminine Monarchie: or, The Historie of Bees: Shewing Their Admirable Nature, and Properties, Their Generation, and Colonies...
      • More-over, as the Buildings Ambligon / May more receive then Mansions Oxigon / (Because th' acute, and the rect-Angles too, / Stride not so wide as obtuse Angles doe) / So doth the Circle in his Circuit span / More room then any other Figure can.1641, “The Columnes. The Fourth Part of the Second Day of the II. Weeke”, in Alexander B. Grosart, editor, The Complete Works of Joshua Sylvester: For the First Time Collected and Edited […]...
    3. (by ellipsis) Obtuse-angled, having an obtuse angle.
      • Unless A lies in that part of a semi-infinite strip bounded by AB outside a semi-circle of diameter AB, the triangle is obtuse, so that the probability of getting an obtuse triangle is equal to 1.2013, Edward J. Barbeau, “Probability and Statistics”, in More Fallacies, Flaws, and Flimflam (Spectrum Series), Washington, D.C.: Mathematical Association of America, →ISBN, page 128
  2. Intellectually dull or dim-witted.
    • It was a merry time with Carrmen, Watermen, & Porters: for in this Eclipſe, many of them did nothing but drinke, domineere, and ſwagger in Alehouſes; but the often going to and fro of the Pot, made them talke of that, which they had nothing to doe withall, and many times their obtuſe apprehenſions...1613, [Robert Anton], Moriomachia, imprinted at London: By Simon Stafford, →OCLC, archived from the original on 14 Jan 2018
    • When the elder Osborne gave what he called "a hint," there was no possibility for the most obtuse to mistake his meaning. He called kicking a footman downstairs a hint to the latter to leave his service.1847 January – 1848 July, William Makepeace Thackeray, chapter 21, in Vanity Fair […], London: Bradbury and Evans […], published 1848, →OCLC
  3. Of sound, etc.: deadened, muffled, muted.
    • The ſenſe of the inteſtines, if exquiſite, wants a more gentle remedie; and if dull, a ſtronger: Alſo the ſenſes of the inteſtines are perceived by the courſe of diet; for thoſe that feed upon muſtard, or the like biting and more ſharp meat, without trouble, are of a more obtuſe ſenſe; but thoſe of...1661, Robert Lovell, “Dynamilogia Pharmaceutica. Or The Whole Use, of All Simples and Compounds Contained in the London Dispensatory, with the Diseases Cured by Them in Alphabetical Order: Together...
    • Another addition in Mr. [Joseph Emerson] Worcester's key to the same letter [e] is what he calls the short and obtuse sound, as in her, herd, fern, fervid. Some of these, also, for the sake of indicating the true sound, [John] Walker was obliged to spell with a different vowel. Thus her is directed...1847 January, “Art. VI.—A Universal and Critical Dictionary of the English Language; to which are added Walker’s Key to the Pronunciation of Classical and Scripture Proper Names, much enlarged and...
    Synonyms:
    deadened, muffled
  4. Indirect or circuitous.
    • […] The Conchologist's First Book intends to do something different by describing both the shell and the soft parts of each creature together. The claim seems awfully trivial, I admit, and [Edgar Allan] Poe does press his point only by the obtuse route of stressing an expansion of terminology, from...2003, Stephen Jay Gould, “The Fusions of Unum and the Benefits of Pluribus”, in The Hedghog, the Fox, and the Magister’s Pox: Mending the Gap between Science and the Humanities, New York, N.Y....

Verb

obtuse (third-person singular simple present obtuses, present participle obtusing, simple past and past participle obtused)

  1. (obsolete, transitive) To dull or reduce an emotion or a physical state.
    • Fouler. To tread, ſtampe, or trample on; to bruiſe, or cruſh, by ſtamping; hurt, or obtuſe, by treading on; […]1611, Randle Cotgrave, compiler, “Fouler”, in A Dictionarie of the French and English Tongues, London: […] Adam Islip, →OCLC, signature Qq ij, verso, column 2
    • The general effect of even a weak infusion of coca leaves is a pleasant irritability and sleeplessness. A stronger infusion keeps hunger away, prevents loss of breath in ascending mountains, dilates the pupil, and obtuses the sensibility to the air.1861 August, “[Miscellaneous.] Coca”, in The United States Journal of Homœopathy, volume II, New York, N.Y.: C. T. Hurlburt, No. 437 Broome Street, →OCLC, page 549

obtuse meaning in Tamil, Urdu, Malayalam and Kannada

obtuse in Tamil

மழுங்கிய, விரிந்த, குறைந்த, கூர் அறிவின்மை, கூர்மையற்ற, மழுங்கிநுனி

obtuse in Urdu

گستاخ, کند, ماند

obtuse in Malayalam

മൂർച്ചയില്ലാത്ത, മുനയില്ലാത്ത, തീക്ഷ്ണമല്ലാത്ത

obtuse in Kannada

ಬಡ್ಡು, ಹರಿತವಿಲ್ಲದ, ಮೊಂಡು, ಮೊಂಡಾದ, ಹರಿತವಾಗಿರದ, ಚೂಪಲ್ಲದ ಮೊನೆ
More languagesFewer languages
obtuse in Punjabi
ਨਾਲਾਇਕ਼ nālāiaq
obtuse in Tagalog
bika
obtuse in Malay
cakah
obtuse in Thai
ป้าน bpâan
obtuse in Myanmar
ကျယ် kyai

Examples of obtuse in a sentence

  • Yet you do not brighten what would otherwise be dull, impart a keenness to the obtusest point, and diffuse a general lustre?1932, Ernest Bramah, chapter XV, in The Moon of Much Gladness: Related by Kai Lung, London: Cassell and Co., →OCLC; republished [s.l.]...
  • If he is standing close beside me I know that our separate axes of vision will meet at an acute angle in the centre of his object, and if we are further apart, at an obtuser angle.1922, May Sinclair, “Space, Time and Other Consciousnesses”, in The New Idealism, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company, →OCLC, section V...
  • Be you a Remainer or a Leaver, you would have to be particularly obtuse not to see that [Theresa] May's hard Tory Brexit will cost this country and its families more than it can conceivably afford.2017 March 27, “The Observer view on triggering article 50: As Britain hurtles towards the precipice, truth and democracy are in short...
  • Another addition in Mr. [Joseph Emerson] Worcester's key to the same letter [e] is what he calls the short and obtuse sound, as in her, herd, fern, fervid.1847 January, “Art. VI.—A Universal and Critical Dictionary of the English Language; to which are added Walker’s Key to the Pronunciation...

All 13 example sentences with obtuse

Synonyms of obtuse

Antonyms

1 more antonymsFewer antonyms

All synonyms and antonyms of obtuse

Forms of obtuse

Adjective
comparativeobtuser
comparativemore obtuse
superlativeobtusest
superlativemost obtuse
Verb
third-person singular presentobtuses
present participleobtusing
past participleobtused
pastobtused

Origin of obtuse

From Middle English obtuse, from Latin obtūsus (“blunt, dull; obtuse”), past participle of obtundere, from obtundō (“to batter, beat, strike; to blunt, dull”), from ob- (“against”) (see ob-) + tundō (“to beat, strike; to bruise, crush, pound”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *(s)tewd-, from *(s)tew- (“to hit; to push”)). More at obtund.

Words formed from obtuse

Phrases with obtuse

Words that rhyme with obtuse

48 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about obtuse

What does obtuse mean?
Obtuse means blunt; not sharp, pointed, or acute in form.
What is obtuse in Tamil?
Obtuse in Tamil is மழுங்கிய, விரிந்த, குறைந்த. See Obtuse meaning in Tamil.
How do you use obtuse in a sentence?
Yet you do not brighten what would otherwise be dull, impart a keenness to the obtusest point, and diffuse a general lustre?
What part of speech is obtuse?
Obtuse can be an adjective or a verb.
How do you pronounce obtuse?
Obtuse is pronounced /əbˈtjuːs/ (UK).

Words near obtuse in the dictionary

  1. obturators
  2. obturbinate
  3. obtusangled
  4. obtusangular
  5. obtusaquinone
  6. obtuse
  7. obtuse angle
  8. obtuse angles
  9. obtuse horn shell
  10. obtuse horn shells
  11. obtuse triangle

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: obtuse (page history and authors); obtuse (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); obtuse (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); obtuse (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); obtuse (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); ਨਾਲਾਇਕ਼ (Punjabi) (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:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-obtuse.ogg, en-au-obtuse.ogg.

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