Definition of choleric
- a perpetually choleric old grouser
watch out for the choleric librarian at the reference desk
I absolutely get choleric when a telemarketer calls during the dinner hour.
These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'choleric.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
First Known Use: 1556
in the meaning defined at sense 1
See Words from the same yearangered, angry, apoplectic, ballistic, enraged, foaming, fuming, furious, hopping, horn-mad, hot, incensed, indignant, inflamed (also enflamed), infuriate, infuriated, irate, ireful, livid, mad, outraged, rabid, rankled, riled, roiled, sore, steamed up, steaming, teed off, ticked, wrathful, wroth;
accepting, accommodating, obliging;
agreeable, amenable, complaisant;
empathetic, sympathetic, tolerant, understanding;
calm, pacific, peaceable, placid, serene, tranquil, unembittered;
affable, amiable, easygoing, genial, good-natured, good-tempered, kind, pleasant, sweet;
boiling, bristling, bristly, burning, cross, huffy, passionate, seething, sizzling, smoldering (or smouldering), worked up, wrought (up);
acrid, acrimonious, antagonistic, antipathetic, bitter, embittered, inimical, malevolent, piqued, rancorous, resentful, spiteful, vengeful, vindictive, virulent, vitriolic;
antisocial, cold, cool, disagreeable, disapproving, distant, frigid, icy, ill-tempered, sorehead (or soreheaded), sulky, unfriendly, unpleasant;
aggravated, annoyed, bearish, cantankerous, churlish, crabby, cranky, dyspeptic, exasperated, fretful, fussy, grouchy, grumpy, ill-humored, irascible, irritable, peevish, perturbed, petulant, put out, quick-tempered, snappish, testy, touchy;
argumentative, belligerent, contentious, contrary, disputatious, ornery, pugnacious, quarrelsome, querulous;
bent out of shape, blue in the face, fit to be tied, hopping mad, hot under the collar, in a fume, in a huff, in a pet;
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