First Known Use: 1752
Dictionary
intriguing
adjective in·trigu·ing \in-ˈtrē-giŋ\
: extremely interesting
Full Definition of INTRIGUING
: engaging the interest to a marked degree : fascinating <an intriguing story>
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Examples of INTRIGUING
- Some had once contained medicines, sarsaparilla, or elixirs; others had intriguing names embossed into their glass panels: Balm of One Thousand Flowers, Indian Cholagogue, Dr. Kilmer's Kidney Cure, and Ocean Weed Heart Remedy. —Kim Wong Keltner, The Dim Sum of All Things, 2004
- The Huns are intriguing not only because of their notoriously hawkish history, but also because of their place as middlemen between Mongol and Turkic ethnicity. —Victor L. Mote, Siberia, 1998
- The next two phases of the Cambrian … mark the strangest, most important, and most intriguing of all episodes in the fossil record of animals—the short interval known as the Cambrian explosion … —Stephen Jay Gould, Natural History, July/August 1998
- The folklorist Jan Brunvand has documented hundreds of “urban legends,” intriguing stories that everyone swears happened to a friend of a friend … and that circulate for years in nearly identical form in city after city, but that can never be documented as real events. —Steven Pinker, The Language Instinct, 1994
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Origin of INTRIGUING
(see 1intrigue)
Related to INTRIGUING
- Synonyms
- absorbing, arresting, consuming, engaging, engrossing, enthralling, fascinating, gripping, immersing, interesting, involving, riveting
- Antonyms
- boring, drab, dry, dull, heavy, monotonous, tedious, uninteresting
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