Did you know?
Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens may be a few of your favorite things, but are they sumptuous? Alas, though the best things in life are often free, sumptuous is a child of the Latin word sumptus, meaning “expense,” and it typically describes things that can only be had at some significant expense. A sumptuous lifestyle, for example, is more likely to involve silver-white bling than a silver-white winter that melts into spring. Sumptus has another English relation, this one tied even more closely to conspicuous consumption: sumptuary laws are largely historical regulations limiting extravagant expenditures and habits, especially on moral or religious grounds. (The sump in consumption is coincidental; that word comes from consume, which has its roots in Latin sumere meaning “to take up, take.”)
Examples of sumptuous in a Sentence
Stefania Conrieri, Vanity Fair, 6 June 2026
Less than two minutes later, Messi lost the ball near the halfway line and a France move ended with a sumptuous, crushing Mbappe volley hitting the back of the net.
—Will Jeanes, New York Times, 5 June 2026
The rooms The 65 rooms (including 17 suites) are subtly sumptuous, like staying at the not-so-humble home of a scion of an Istanbul dynasty.
—Condé Nast, Condé Nast Traveler, 2 June 2026
The paint is deftly mottled but its handling lacks the prowess of her later work (see, for example, Being Beamed, 1984, a fantasia of extraterrestrial teleportation in which the watercolor is sumptuous but perfectly controlled).
—Jeremy Lybarger, Artforum, 2 June 2026
See All Example Sentences for sumptuous
Cite this Entry
“Sumptuous.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/sumptuous. Accessed 13 Jun. 2026.
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sumptuous
adjective
