Fastidious Definition

fă-stĭdē-əs, fə-
adjective
Showing or acting with careful attention to detail.
A fastidious scholar; fastidious research.
American Heritage
Not easy to please; overly exacting or discriminating.
Webster's New World
Refined in a dainty or oversensitive way.
Webster's New World
Excessively scrupulous or sensitive, as in taste, propriety, or neatness.
American Heritage
Having complex nutritional requirements.
American Heritage Medicine

Origin of Fastidious

  • From Latin fastidiosus (“passive: that feels disgust, disdainful, scornful, fastidious; active: that causes disgust, disgusting, loathsome”), from fastidium (“a loathing, aversion, disgust, niceness of taste, daintiness, etc.”), perhaps for *fastutidium, from fastus (“disdain, haughtiness, arrogance, disgust”) + taedium (“disgust”). Confer French fastidieux.

    From Wiktionary

  • Middle English squeamish, particular, haughty from Old French fastidieux from Latin fastīdiōsus from fastīdium squeamishness, haughtiness probably from fastus disdain

    From American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition

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