salacious

adjective

sa·​la·​cious sə-ˈlā-shəs How to pronounce salacious (audio)
1
: arousing or appealing to sexual desire or imagination
salacious headlines
salacious lyrics
2
: lecherous, lustful
… have fiercely denounced the book's sketches of melodramatic lovers and salacious partygoers …Casey Greenfield
salaciously adverb
salaciousness noun

Examples of salacious in a Sentence

Lady Worsley's Whim, the story of Lady Worsley and her husband Sir Richard Worsley, is also reconstructed from some well-thumbed texts, in this case trial transcripts and newspaper reports of cases of "Criminal Conversation" which became popular eighteenth-century erotica. Charges … were brought by husbands seeking damages from the purported lovers of their supposedly adulterous wives, and the detail, which needed to be explicit, was frequently salacious. Norma Clarke, Times Literary Supplement, 21 Nov. 2008
From snarky political commentary to salacious "memoirs" that flirt with both fact and fiction, scores of bloggers have gotten the book deal boon—with mixed results at the register. Eunice Lee et al., Hyphen, Winter 2007
There's little difference between the junk mail in your mailbox and the junk e-mail that appears on your monitor, except that the e-mail is often of a salacious nature, e.g., the "hot, live XXX action" available at various dark alleyways on the web. Michael Saunders, Boston Globe, 6 Oct.1997
a song with salacious lyrics the salacious Greek god Pan is generally portrayed as having the legs, horns, and ears of a goat
Recent Examples on the Web And, if the newspaper in question is a tabloid featuring a salacious photo and/or punny headline on the front page, discard it on some form of public transportation for a stranger to enjoy. Mark Remy, The New Yorker, 17 Oct. 2024 Meanwhile, his response includes more salacious details about Nuzzi’s relationship with Kennedy. Martha Ross, The Mercury News, 16 Oct. 2024 The salacious details in the book, purportedly taken from Porter’s diary, have fueled many of the conspiracy theories around Combs. Kathleen Walsh, Glamour, 25 Sep. 2024 If this were a sympathetic exercise instead of a salacious one, a more algebraic reconsideration could use the modern vocabulary and cultural nuance Brennan said the Menendezs didn’t have at the time. Alison Foreman, IndieWire, 24 Sep. 2024 See all Example Sentences for salacious 

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'salacious.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Word History

Etymology

Latin salac-, salax, from salire to move spasmodically, leap — more at sally

First Known Use

circa 1645, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Time Traveler
The first known use of salacious was circa 1645

Dictionary Entries Near salacious

Cite this Entry

“Salacious.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/salacious. Accessed 31 Oct. 2024.

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