- Obs. of noble birth or nature
- frank; open; candid
- simple; artless; naive; without guile
Origin of ingenuous
Classical Latin ingenuus, native, inborn, freeborn, noble, frank from ingignere, to engender from in-, in + gignere, to produce: see genus
adjective
The definition of ingenuous is open or frank.
An example of ingenuous is a person who tells the truth.
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"ingenuous." YourDictionary, n.d. Web. 18 January 2019. <https://www.yourdictionary.com/Ingenuous>.
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ingenuous. (n.d.). Retrieved January 18th, 2019, from https://www.yourdictionary.com/Ingenuous
ingenuous
Webster's New World College Dictionary, Fifth Edition Copyright © 2014 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.
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"ingenuous." YourDictionary, n.d. Web. 18 January 2019. <https://www.yourdictionary.com/Ingenuous>.
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ingenuous. (n.d.). Retrieved January 18th, 2019, from https://www.yourdictionary.com/Ingenuous
ingenuous
adjective
- Lacking in cunning, guile, or worldliness; innocent or naive: I'm not so ingenuous as to believe everything he says. See Synonyms at naive.
- Straightforward or frank; candid: “I must be so ingenuous as to own that the accounts are not so certain as to the exact time and place of his birth” ( Memoir of Martinus Scriblerus )
Origin of ingenuous
Latin ingenuus honest, freeborn ; see genə- in Indo-European roots.Related Forms:
- in·gen′u·ous·ly
adverb
- in·gen′u·ous·ness
noun
THE AMERICAN HERITAGE® DICTIONARY OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE, FIFTH EDITION by the Editors of the American Heritage Dictionaries. Copyright © 2016, 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.
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MLA Style
"ingenuous." YourDictionary, n.d. Web. 18 January 2019. <https://www.yourdictionary.com/Ingenuous>.
APA Style
ingenuous. (n.d.). Retrieved January 18th, 2019, from https://www.yourdictionary.com/Ingenuous
Adjective
(comparative more ingenuous, superlative most ingenuous)
- Naive and trusting.
- Demonstrating childlike simplicity.
- Unsophisticated; simple.
- Unable to mask one's feelings.
- Straightforward, candid, open, and frank.
Usage notes
Do not confuse with ingenious.
Origin
From Latin ingenuus ("of noble character, frank")
English Wiktionary. Available under CC-BY-SA license.
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MLA Style
"ingenuous." YourDictionary, n.d. Web. 18 January 2019. <https://www.yourdictionary.com/Ingenuous>.
APA Style
ingenuous. (n.d.). Retrieved January 18th, 2019, from https://www.yourdictionary.com/Ingenuous
Sentence Examples
- He has, indeed, a true love of England, sometimes not without a suspicion of insularity, but always fresh and ingenuous.
- The ingenuous faith of a Louis IX.
- It may, however, be granted that the possibility of lapse throws us open to the objections, ingenuous or disingenuous, of the sceptic; and we must remain exposed to them so long as we deal with our first principles as so many isolated axioms or intuitions.
- But he was the one man of ability who could hope to rule the debris of the kingdom of Jerusalem with success; he was the master of an Italian statecraft which gave him the advantage over his ingenuous rival; and Richard was finally forced to recognize him as king (April 11 9 2).
WORDS NEAR ingenuous IN THE DICTIONARY
- ingenuous
- ingenuities
- ingenuitive
- ingenuitous