rambunctious
adjective
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Rambunctious Has (Possible) British Origins
Rambunctious first appeared in print in the early half of the 19th century, at a time when the fast-growing United States was forging its identity and indulging in a fashion for colorful new coinages suggestive of the young nation's optimism and exuberance. Rip-roaring, scalawag, scrumptious, hornswoggle, and skedaddle are other examples of the lively language of that era. Did Americans alter the largely British rumbustious because it sounded, well, British? That could be. Rumbustious, which first appeared in Britain in the late 1700s just after the signing of the Declaration of Independence, was probably based on robustious, a much older adjective that meant both "robust" and "boisterous."
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Examples of rambunctious in a Sentence
Ilana Frost, Peoplemag, 26 May 2024
Nathan Lane and Ernie Sabella, who voiced meerkat Timon and warthog Pumbaa, respectively, in 1994's The Lion King, tell Entertainment Weekly that Pumbaa's flatulence actually came out of a particularly rambunctious recording session.
—Maureen Lee Lenker, EW.com, 22 May 2024
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Cite this Entry
“Rambunctious.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/rambunctious. Accessed 29 May. 2024.
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rambunctious
adjective
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