overweening
UK/əʊvəˈwiːnɪŋ//oʊvɚˈwinɪŋ/
overweening adjective: unduly confident; (sometimes also) arrogant. Also the present participle and gerund of overween.
Adjective
overweening (comparative more overweening, superlative most overweening)
- Unduly confident; (sometimes also) arrogant.
- She wins one modeling contest in Montana and suddenly she’s overweening.
- Heere's an ouer-weening rogue.c. 1601–1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “Twelfe Night, or What You Will”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and...
- Synonyms:
- overconfident, presumptuous, conceited, airy, arrogant, chesty, authoritarian, biggity, big-headed, blustery
- Antonyms:
- underconfident, unconfident, uncertain, unsure, timid
- Exaggerated, excessive.
- The idea that an overweening federal government is a threat to both freedom and equality (not to mention prosperity) goes back to Jefferson, James Madison, Patrick Henry and some other fairly respectable personages.2015 January 4, Jonathan Rauch, “How to Make Men Free”, in NY Times
- Synonyms:
- immoderate, unrestrained, devilish, excessive, horrendous, de trop, extravagant, extreme, intemperate, lavish
- Antonyms:
- moderate, appropriate, due, apropos
Noun
overweening (countable and uncountable, plural overweenings)
- An excessively high opinion of oneself or one’s abilities; presumption, arrogance.
- Let us suppresse this over-weening [translating cuider], the first foundation of the tyrannie of the wicked spirit[…].1603, Michel de Montaigne, chapter 12, in John Florio, transl., The Essayes […], book II, London: […] Val[entine] Simmes for Edward Blount […], →OCLC, page 258
Also used as
overweening is also the present participle and gerund of overween.
Examples of overweening in a sentence
- No success rendered him overweening and no disaster was ever known to stagger his firmness.1870, Carl Schurz, George H. Thomas Eulogy:
- The Senate was displaying an overweening hauteur as if it were the government.1908, Frederic Bancroft, William A. Dunning, A Sketch of Carl Schurz’s Political Career:
- The Valley prizes overweening ambition but expects it to be “rifle-focussed” on making the world’s best houseboat-rental platform or Cognac-delivery service.2016 October 3, Tad Friend, “Sam Altman’s Manifest Destiny”, in The New Yorker:
- While they ultimately came to the same conclusion, the pre-emptive tweet made it harder to rebut the court's judgment that they were “supine servants of an overweening master”.2024 May 18, Tabby Kinder, Stephen Morris, “Tesla chair on Musk: ‘I might wake up to a tweet. I don’t wake up to a strategy shift’”, in FT...
Synonyms of overweening
30 more synonymsFewer synonyms
- turgescent
- boastful
- lordly
- bombastic
- cocky
- disdainful
- domineering
- egotistical
- entitled
- flaunting
- full of oneself
- grandiose
- hankty
- haughty
- high-handed
- high-hat
- high and mighty
- highfalutin
- hoity-toity
- holier-than-thou
- hubristic
- hubristical
- imperious
- inflated
- insolent
- la-di-da
- ostentatious
- overbearing
- pompous
- pretentious
Antonyms
Forms of overweening
| Adjective | |
|---|---|
| comparative | more overweening |
| superlative | most overweening |
| alternative form | over-weening |
| Noun | |
| plural | overweenings |
Origin of overweening
From Middle English overweninge, equivalent to overween + -ing. Cognate with obsolete Dutch overwanig, overwaand (“presumptuous; cocky; conceited”).
From Middle English overweninge, equivalent to overween + -ing.
See the etymology of the corresponding lemma form.
Words formed from overweening
Words that rhyme with overweening
Questions about overweening
- What does overweening mean?
- Overweening means unduly confident; (sometimes also) arrogant.
- How do you use overweening in a sentence?
- No success rendered him overweening and no disaster was ever known to stagger his firmness.
- What part of speech is overweening?
- Overweening can be an adjective or a noun.
- How do you pronounce overweening?
- Overweening is pronounced /əʊvəˈwiːnɪŋ/ (UK).
Words near overweening in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: overweening (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: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Persent101-overweening.wav.
Cite this entry: “overweening.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/overweening. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.