sybaritic
Syllables: sy·bar·it·ic/ˌsɪbəˈɹɪtɪk/US/ˌsɪbəˈɹɪtɪk/
sybaritic adjective: of or having the qualities of a sybarite (“a person devoted to luxury and pleasure”); dedicated to excessive comfort and enjoyment; decadent, hedonistic, self-indulgent.
Adjective (1)
sybaritic (comparative more sybaritic, superlative most sybaritic)
- Of or having the qualities of a sybarite (“a person devoted to luxury and pleasure”); dedicated to excessive comfort and enjoyment; decadent, hedonistic, self-indulgent.
- His belly is a Ceſterne of receit, / A grand Confounder of demulcing Meate. / A Sabariticke Sea, a depthleſſe Gulfe, / A ſenceleſſe Vulture, a corroding VVolfe.Henry Hutton (September 1842), Edward F[rancis] Rimbault, editor, Follie’s Anatomie: Or Satyres & Satyricall Epigrams […], London: […] [T. Richards] for the Percy Society, →OCLC, page 22
- [S]he, for whom attendant maidens had smoothed the Sybaritic sheet of finest texture, […]1840, F[rederick] M[arryat], “How to Write a Romance”, in Olla Podrida. […], volume III, London: Longman, Orme, Brown, Green, & Longmans, […], →OCLC, page 252
- Synonyms:
- epicurean, lotus-eating, sybarite, sybaritical, Babylonian, decadent, epicureal, epicureous, epicurish, hedonic
Adjective (2) capitalized: Sybaritic
Sybaritic (comparative more Sybaritic, superlative most Sybaritic)
- Of or relating to Sybaris or its inhabitants.
- This last passage of Jamblichuns, where he intimates that Cyclon's conspiracy came quickly after the Sybaritic war, being not only corrupted in original, but most miserably handled in the Latin translation; […]1777, Richard Bentley, Samuel Salter, A Dissertation upon the Epistles of Phalaris: With an Answer to the Objections of the Hon. Charles Boyle, page 49
- Alternative letter-case form of sybaritic (“of or having the qualities of a sybarite (“a person devoted to luxury and pleasure”); dedicated to excessive comfort and enjoyment; decadent, hedonistic, self-indulgent”).
- [S]he, for whom attendant maidens had smoothed the Sybaritic sheet of finest texture, […]1840, F[rederick] M[arryat], “How to Write a Romance”, in Olla Podrida. […], volume III, London: Longman, Orme, Brown, Green, & Longmans, […], →OCLC, page 252
- But Fate, it appeared, had arranged beforehand to frustrate this Sybaritic dream.1913, Norman Lindsay, A Curate in Bohemia, Sydney: N.S.W. Bookstall Co., published 1932, page 155
Examples of sybaritic in a sentence
- He seeks to work in the arena? […] His is a manly trade; sybaritic Rome, that is becoming effeminate, needs to see muscle at work, recalling more primitive glories.1985 September 1, Anthony Burgess, chapter 2, in The Kingdom of the Wicked, London: Allison & Busby, published 2009, →ISBN, page 168:
- He's such a joyful, celebratory, sybaritic person.2017 October 16, Alexandra Schwartz, quoting Jennifer Egan, “Jennifer Egan’s Travels Through Time”, in The New Yorker, New York, N.Y.: New...
Synonyms of sybaritic
- epicurean
- lotus-eating
- sybarite
- Babylonian
- decadent
- epicureal
- epicureous
- epicurish
- hedonic
- hedonistic
9 more synonymsFewer synonyms
Forms of sybaritic
| comparative | more sybaritic |
|---|---|
| superlative | most sybaritic |
| alternative form | Sybaritic |
| comparative | more Sybaritic |
| superlative | most Sybaritic |
Origin of sybaritic
Learned borrowing from Latin Sybarīticus (“of or pertaining to Sybaris or its inhabitants”) + English -ic (suffix meaning ‘of or pertaining to’, forming adjectives from nouns). Sybarīticus is derived from Ancient Greek Συβαρῑτικός (Subarītikós), from Σῠβᾰρῑ́της (Sŭbărī́tēs, “(noun) inhabitant of Sybaris; (adjective) decadent; self-indulgent”) (from Σῠ́βᾰρῐς (Sŭ́bărĭs, “Sybaris”) + -ῑ́της (-ī́tēs, suffix forming demonyms)) + -κός (-kós, suffix meaning ‘of or pertaining to’, forming adjectives). The English word is analysable as Sybarite (“inhabitant of Sybaris”) + -ic. Sybaris, a city of Magna Graecia (the coastal parts of Sicily and southern Italy once colonized by Greek settlers), was known for its wealth and the excesses and hedonism of its inhabitants.
Words formed from sybaritic
Words that rhyme with sybaritic
Questions about sybaritic
- What does sybaritic mean?
- Sybaritic means of or having the qualities of a sybarite (“a person devoted to luxury and pleasure”); dedicated to excessive comfort and enjoyment; decadent, hedonistic, self-indulgent.
- How do you use sybaritic in a sentence?
- He seeks to work in the arena? […] His is a manly trade; sybaritic Rome, that is becoming effeminate, needs to see muscle at work, recalling more primitive glories.
- What part of speech is sybaritic?
- Sybaritic is an adjective.
- How do you pronounce sybaritic?
- Sybaritic is pronounced /ˌsɪbəˈɹɪtɪk/ (UK).
Words near sybaritic in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: sybaritic (page history and authors); Sybaritic (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.
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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-sybaritic.wav.
Cite this entry: “sybaritic.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/sybaritic. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.