incivility

From Middle French incivilité, from Late Latin incivilitas (“incivility”), from Latin incivilis (“impolite, uncivil”), from in- (privative prefix) + civilis (“belonging to a citizen, civic, political, urbane, courteous, civil”) (from civis (“a citizen”)), equivalent to in- +‎ civility.

• IPA^(key): /ɪnsɪˈvɪlɪti/

• Audio (Southern England)

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• Hyphenation: in‧ci‧vil‧i‧ty

incivility (countable and uncountable, plural incivilities)

1. (uncountable) The state of being uncivil; lack of courtesy; rudeness in manner.

   Synonym: impoliteness

   • c. 1594 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Comedie of Errors”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act IV, scene iv]:

     Courtezan. How say you now? is not your husband mad? / Adriana. His incivility confirms no less.

   • 1668, David Lloyd, Memoires of the Lives, Actions, Sufferings, and Deaths of those Noble, Reverend, and Excellent Personages that suffered by Death, Sequestration, Decimation, and otherwise for the Protestant Religion, London: Samuel Speed, “The Life and Death of Robert Berkley,” p. 96,

     Beat on proud Billows, Boreas blow,

     Swell curled Waves, high as Jove’s roof,

     Your incivility doth show,

     That Innocence is tempest proof.

   • 1811, [Jane Austen], chapter XXXI, in Sense and Sensibility […], volumes (please specify |volume=I to III), London: […] C[harles] Roworth, […], and published by T[homas] Egerton, […], →OCLC:

     Little did Mr. Willoughby imagine, I suppose, when his looks censured me for incivility in breaking up the party, that I was called away to the relief of one whom he had made poor and miserable […]

   • 1927 May, Virginia Woolf, chapter 1, in To the Lighthouse (Uniform Edition of the Works of Virginia Woolf), new edition, London: Leonard and Virginia Woolf at the Hogarth Press, […], published 1930, →OCLC:

     [S]he could not bear incivility to her guests, to young men in particular […]

2. (countable) Any act of rudeness or ill-breeding.
   • 1626, Ovid, “(please specify the page)”, in George Sandys, transl., Ovid’s Metamorphosis Englished […], London: […] William Stansby, →OCLC:

     Latona, in her flight from Juno, is churlishly intreated by the Lycian pesants, and denied the publique benefit of water: for which incivility these bawling Clownes are changed into croaking froggs, and confined unto that Lake for ever.

   • a. 1639 (date written), Henry Wotton, “[Letters, &c. and Characters of Sundry Personages, […].] My Deare Nic. Pey.”, in Reliquiæ Wottonianæ. Or, A Collection of Lives, Letters, Poems; […], London: […] Thomas Maxey, for R[ichard] Marriot, G[abriel] Bedel, and T[imothy] Garthwait, published 1651, →OCLC, page 507:

     In truth, vve thought it (coming immediately from an infected place) an hazardous incivilitie, to put our ſelves upon them; for if any ſiniſter accident had fallen out about the ſame time (for Coincidents are not alvvaies Cauſes) vve ſhould have rued it for ever.

   • 1748, [Samuel Richardson], “Letter IV”, in Clarissa. Or, The History of a Young Lady: […], volume I, London: […] S[amuel] Richardson;  […], →OCLC, page 26:

     Mr. Lovelace, for three days together, sent twice each day to inquire after my brother’s health; and, altho’ he received rude, and even shocking returns, he thought fit, on the fourth day, to make in person the fame inquiries; and received still greater incivilities from my two uncles, who happen’d to be both there.

   • 1889, Sabine Baring-Gould, “A Face in the Dark” in Pennycomequicks, London: Spencer, Blackett & Hallam, Volume II, p. 54:

     When my poor Sidebottom was alive, if there had been any unpleasantness between us during the day [...] I have shaken him at night to wake him up, that he might receive my pardon for an incivility said or done.

3. (uncountable) Lack of civilization; a state of rudeness or barbarism.
   • 1781, [Mostyn John Armstrong], History and Antiquities of the County of Norfolk. Volume IX. Containing the Hundreds of Smithdon, Taverham, Tunstead, Walsham, and Wayland, volume IX, Norwich: Printed by J. Crouse, for M. Booth, bookseller, →OCLC, page 51:

     BEAT on, proud billows; Boreas blow; / Swell, curled waves, high as Jove's roof; / Your incivility doth ſhow, / That innocence is tempeſt proof; / Though ſurly Nereus frown, my thoughts are calm; / Then ſtrike, Affliction, for thy wounds are balm. [Attributed to Roger L'Estrange (1616–1704).]

• incivil

• discourtesy
• disrespect
• impoliteness
• rudeness
• uncourteousness
• unmannerliness

• “incivility”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.
• “incivility”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.