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adjective

Covetous adj.

Very desirous; eager to obtain; used in a good sense. (Archaic) "Covetous of wisdom and fair virtue." "Covetous death bereaved us all, To aggrandize one funeral."

Inordinately desirous; excessively eager to obtain and possess (esp. money); avaricious; in a bad sense. "The covetous person lives as if the world were madealtogether for him, and not he for the world."

Synonyms: Avaricious; parsimonious; penurious; misrely; niggardly. See Avaricious.

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Etymology of 'Covetous'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Covetous" Quotes from Famous Books

... she slept in the little tent, and Stane, wrapped in a blanket, slumbered on a bed of spruce-boughs, perhaps half-a-dozen yards away, a man crept cautiously between the trees in the rear of the encampment, and stood looking at it with covetous eyes. He was a half-breed of evil countenance, and he carried an old trade gun, which he held ready for action whilst he surveyed the silent camp. His dark eyes fell on Stane sleeping in the open, and then looked towards the tent with a question in them. Evidently he was ...

— A Mating in the Wilds • Ottwell Binns

... that the youth was one whom ordinary people would call a lover of money; I do not believe he was covetous, or desired even the large increase of his possessions; I imagine he was just like most good men of property: he valued his possessions—looked on them as a good. I suspect that in the case of another, he would ...

— Unspoken Sermons - Series I., II., and II. • George MacDonald

... In a moment the deep stillness of the forest was broken by the pattering of many little feet; from the thickets the hogs came; each hurrying with might and main to be foremost, they rushed, grunting, squealing, crowding to the fence, where, standing with upturned faces and small covetous eyes, they awaited the feast of golden grain which the old man hastened to scatter amongst them. Then, leaning upon the fence, he noted each greedy grunter as he wriggled his small tail in keenest enjoyment and cracked ...

— Plantation Sketches • Margaret Devereux

... the plague brought out the good in a man, sometimes changed his life from one of covetous indifference or grasping selfishness into a life of earnestness and devout philanthropy, it happened at other times—and I fear it must be confessed more frequently—that coarse natures, hard and cruel ones, were made ...

— The Coming of the Friars • Augustus Jessopp

... mistaken. The King of Prussia, who is so covetous of that which belongs to others, will gladly share ...

— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach

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