REFRACTORY • FREE-TRANSLATOR.COM • Definition of Refractory

Translators

Dictionaries

Courses

Other

Home

Add this Dictionary
to your website!
See more options...

/rəfrˈæktəri/ Listen $Listen 'refractory'$

adjective

Refractory adj.

Obstinate in disobedience; contumacious; stubborn; unmanageable; as, a refractory child; a refractory beast. "Raging appetites that are Most disobedient and refractory."

Resisting ordinary treatment; difficult of fusion, reduction, or the like; said especially of metals and the like, which do not readily yield to heat, or to the hammer; as, a refractory ore.

Synonyms: Perverse; contumacious; unruly; stubborn; obstinate; unyielding; ungovernable; unmanageable.

noun

Refractory n.

A refractory person.

Refractoriness. (Obs.)

OPottery) A piece of ware covered with a vaporable flux and placed in a kiln, to communicate a glaze to the other articles.

$See images of 'Refractory'$ See images of 'Refractory'

$Etymology of 'Refractory'$ Etymology of 'Refractory'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

Share |

"Refractory" Quotes from Famous Books

... to fine gentlemen and ladies, and were probably received with sympathetic approbation. It is certain they were in general religiously observed by his subjects, and executed by him with impartiality; neither rank nor fortune shielded the refractory from his resentment." Nash, however, was not content with prose in enforcing good manners. Having waged deadly war against the custom of wearing boots, and having found his ordinary armoury of no avail ...

— Goldsmith - English Men of Letters Series • William Black

... responsibility; for although for the last two years he had been in charge of a district, it was not far from Sydney, and his duties consisted principally in hunting for convicts who had made their escape, in looking after refractory ticket-of-leave men, and in ordinary constabulary work. He had learned in that time to become a first-rate rider, and a good shot with a pistol, accomplishments which would be of vital service when he was ordered to an up-country station. For his pistols ...

— A Final Reckoning - A Tale of Bush Life in Australia • G. A. Henty

... bawled the old maid, half squeaking through her nose, which was well charged with rappee, "did'nt I tell you so? I knew the fellow would not come to terms no more than will your refractory daughter. This love fairly bewitches such foolish, crack-brained youngsters. But say Mr. ——, what's your name, addressing herself to Alonzo, will love heat the oven? will love boil the pot? will love clothe ...

— Alonzo and Melissa - The Unfeeling Father • Daniel Jackson, Jr.

... Egyptian art. But it was not only in carving ivory, which is easy to work, that the Egyptian artists showed their skill. They also make bowls and vases of diorite and porphyry with the same success; and the forms presented by the smaller ivory vases are also to be found in vases made of those refractory stones. Further, the vases made of stone present not merely such forms as might be made by turning or boring, but there are also bowls with ribs which are as finely polished as the turned bowls. The hardest material used in the objects already found is rock ...

— Scientific American Supplement, No. 1178, June 25, 1898 • Various

... stepped toward the road as though to halt him. Barney pretended to be fussing with some refractory piece of controlling mechanism beneath the cowl—apparently he did not see the officer. He was just opposite him when the latter shouted to him. Barney straightened up quickly and saluted, but did ...

— The Mad King • Edgar Rice Burroughs

More quotes...