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GRE Vocab
gre vocab
| word | definition | example |
|---|---|---|
| abate | to lessen in intensity | the storm will _______ |
| aberrant | deviating from the norm | a woman doing a man's job was considered ________ |
| accolade | an expression of praise | he received an _________ for his achievment |
| acerbic | acidic, sour, bitter taste or character | her tone was ______ revealing the bitterness she felt |
| acumen | keenness;insight; depth of perception | young adults seem to have little or no political _________ |
| adulation | excessive praise; intense adoration | |
| alacrity | eager and enthusiastic willingness | |
| alchemy | transforming metal into gold; transforming something common into something special | |
| amalgamate | to combine/mix several elements into a whole | |
| anachronism | out of place in historical or chronological order | |
| abdication | to cast off; discard; relinquish power | |
| abet | to encourage; assist in achieving a purpose | |
| abeyance | suspension; temporary inactivity | |
| abhor | hate, detest | |
| abjure | to renounce upon oath; to avoid | |
| abstruse | difficulty to comprehend | |
| assuage | to ease or lessen, appease or pacify | |
| audacious | daring, bold | |
| austere | severely simple, ascetic | |
| avarice | greed for wealth | |
| aver | state as a fact, confirm or support | |
| axiom | universal principle, a given possessing self evident truth | |
| bolster | to provide reinforcement | |
| bombast | pompous speech or writing | |
| bucolic | characteristic of rural areas | |
| burgeon | to grow rapidly, flourish | |
| cacophony | dissonance; harsh sound | |
| canon | established set of principles or code of laws often religious in nature | |
| canonical | in agreement with orthodox requirements | |
| capricious | changing ones mind impulsively, erratic, unpredictable | |
| castigation | severe criticism or punishment | |
| caustic | burning or stinging(could be from intense emotion), causing errosion | |
| chary | wary, cautious | |
| chicanery | trickery or subterfuge | |
| cogent | convincing; appealing to the mind or reason | |
| connoisseur | expert in matters of taste | |
| contentious | argumentative; causing disagreement or controversy | |
| contrite | regretful | |
| convoluted | complicated | |
| credulous | gullible, tend to believe anything readily | |
| culpable | deserving blame | |
| dearth | scarcity, smallness/lack of quantity | |
| decorum | poltite or appropriate conduct | |
| demur | to question or oppose | |
| derision | scorn, redicule, contemptuous treatment | |
| desiccate | to dry out or dehydrate | |
| diatribe | a harsh denunciation | |
| didactic | intended to teach or instruct | |
| dilettante | one with amateurish or superficial interest in the arts or a branch of knowledge | |
| discordant | conflicting, disonant in sound | |
| disparage | to belittle | |
| disparate | fundamentally distinct | |
| dissemble | to disguise; mislead | |
| dogmatic | stubbornly opinionated | |
| ebullience | lively or enthusiastice expression of thought and feelings | |
| eccentric | departing from norms or conventions | |
| ecclectic | composed of elements from various sources | |
| effrontery | extreme boldness; presumptuousness | |
| elegy | a mournful poem | |
| emollient | soothing to the skin; making less harsh | |
| empirical | based on observation or experiment | |
| endemic | characteristic of a particular region or people | |
| enervate | weaken, reduce in vitality | |
| enigmatic | difficult to understand, obscure | |
| ennui | dissatisfaction and restlessness resulting from boredom | |
| ephermal | brief, fleeting | |
| equivocate | to use ambiguous language intending to deceive | |
| erudite | scholarly, very learned | |
| esoteric | intended for or understood by a small specific group | |
| evanescent | tending to disappear/vanish like vapor | |
| exacerbate | make worse | |
| exculpate | clear of blame, exonerate | |
| capitulate | surrender often after negotiation of term | |
| exigent | urgent; pressing | |
| exonerate | remove blame | |
| extemporaneous | done without preparation, improvised | |
| facetious | playful or humorous | |
| fallacy | invalid notion, mistaken belief | |
| fawn | flatter or praise excessively | |
| fervent | greatly emotional or zealous | |
| filibuster | intentional obstruction, using prolonged speechmaking to delay legislative action | |
| flout | to demonstrate contempt for | flouting the rules |
| fortuitous | happening by fortunate accident or chance | it was indeed ______ to find you after all these years in that crowd |
| fulminate | loudly attack or denounce | It is no use to _______ against one aspect while disregarding the whole issue |
| furtive | marked by stealth; covert; in secret | every now and then, she would direct a _______ look at him, hoping it would go unnoticed |
| garrulous | pointlessly talkative, talking too much | I am neither silent nor _________ |
| germane | relevant to the subject at hand | that sentence proves to be ________ to the theme of the story |
| glib | marked by ease or informality; nonchalant; superficial | sometimes, one has a ______ tongue in social gatherings. |
| gregarious | sociable, outgoing | (blank) |
| hackneyed | to common, trite, or vulgar from frequent use | (blank) |
| halcyon | calm and peaceful | (blank) |
| harangue | a ranting speech or writing (pompus | (blank) |
| hedonism | devosion to pursuing pleasure | (blank) |
| hegemony | dominance of one state or ideology over the others | (blank) |
| heretical | violating accepted dogma or convention | (blank) |
| hubris | arrogant presumption or pride | (blank) |
| hyperbole | exagerates statement uses a figure of speech | (blank) |
| iconoclast | one who attacks or undermined traditional conventions or institutions | (blank) |
| idolatrous | intense or excessive devotion to something | (blank) |
| imminent | about to happen | (blank) |
| immutable | cant change | (blank) |
| impassive | revealing no emotion | (blank) |
| impecunious | lacking funds | (blank) |
| impetous | hastily energetic; impulsive | (blank) |
| implacable | not capable of being appease or changed | (blank) |
| impunity | immunity from punishment or penalty | (blank) |
| inchoate | not fully formed | (blank) |
| incipient | beginning to come into being or become apparent | (blank) |
| inert | lethargic, unmoving | (blank) |
| infelicitous | unfortunate, inappropriate | (blank) |
| ingenuous | artless;frank; lacking in sophistication | (blank) |
| inimical | damaging, harmful | (blank) |
| innocuous | harmless | (blank) |
| insipid | without taste, flavor, spirit; bland | (blank) |
| intrepid | courageous | (blank) |
| inured | accustomed to accepting something undesirable | (blank) |
| inveigle | to obtain by deception or flatter | (blank) |
| irascible | easily angered | (blank) |
| expiation | ending/expiring | (blank) |
| exscind | to cut out/cut away | (blank) |
| tout | person who worries others to buy smth/to use his service | (blank) |
| timorous | fearful/timid/afraid | (blank) |
| felon | person guilty of murder | (blank) |
| expedient | likely to be useful for a purpose | (blank) |
| extenuate | reduce the strength of/lessen seriousness/partially excuse | (blank) |
| reticent | quiet, reserved | (blank) |
| nascent | coming into being, in early develpmental stages | (blank) |
| obviate | to anticipate and make unnecessary | (blank) |
| onerous | troubling, burdensome | (blank) |
| enervate | to weaken, to redue in vitality | (blank) |
| perspicacious | acutely perceptive | (blank) |
| predilection | a disposition in favor of something | (blank) |
| prescience | foreknowledge of events | (blank) |
| prevaricate | to deliberately avoid the truth | (blank) |
| solicitous | concerned and attentive, eager | (blank) |
| paean | a song/hymn of praise | (blank) |
| perfidy | intentional breach of faith | (blank) |
| perfunctory | cursory, done without care or interest | (blank) |
| cloister | to confine, seclude | (blank) |
| cloying | indulgin to excess | (blank) |
| coffer | strongbox, large chest for money | (blank) |
| cogent | logically forceful, compelling, convincing | (blank) |
| cognomen | family name; any name, especially a nickname | (blank) |
| compendious | summarizing completely and briefly | (blank) |
| coquette | women who flirts | (blank) |
| macabre | gruesome, producing horror | (blank) |
| maladroit | clumsy, tacktless | (blank) |
| malady | illness | (blank) |
| malaporpism | humorous misuse of a word | (blank) |
| malediction | curse | (blank) |
| obfuscate | to confuse, obscure | (blank) |
| objurgate | scold | (blank) |
| obloquy | abusive language; ill repute | (blank) |
| obsequious | overly submissive, brownnosing | (blank) |
| obsequy | funeral ceremony | (blank) |
| abjure | v. to renounce or reject solemnly; to recant; to avoid | the reformed socialite _____ her former lifestyle and all those with whom she had previously associated. |
| abrogate | v. to abolish or annul by authority; put down | The court ruling ______ed the defendant's rights to any profit from the sale of the house |
| abscission | n. act of cutting off or removing | Dr. Carter recommended an immediate _____ of the abscess in order to minimize any further infection. |
| abscond | v. to depart clandestinely; to steal off and hide. | Doub was left penniless when the two con men _______ed with his life savings. |
| accretion | n. growth, increased by successive addition, building up | Limestone is formed by the _____ of tiny particles from objects such as shells and coral over a very, very long time. |
| admonish | v. to reprove; to express warning or disapproval | How many times has your roomate ____ed you to put the toilet seat down? |
| adroit | adj. adept, dexterous | Karl had always been an ____ manipulator; even when he was a kid he could get people to do what he wanted. |
| maladroit | clumsy or bungling. | Jerry Lewis was able to make a career out of playing _____ maladroit. |
| adulterate | v. to reduce purity by combining with inferior ingredients | There was a huge scandal when customers discovered that the health food store had been _____ing the wheat grass juice with clippings from the front lawn. |
| adumbrate | v. to foreshadow vaguely, intimate, suggest, or outline sketchily. | The possibilities for further cooperation between the two parties were _____ed at the first, private meeting, but nothing was finalized until much later. |
| aesthetic | adj. dealing with, appreciative of, or responsive to art or the beautiful. | Many people say they see no _____ value in modern artwork, claiming the pieces look like a kindergartener's finger painting. |
| aggrandize | v. to increase in intensity, power, or prestige; to make appear greater. | The multi-million dollar advertising campaign was part of a plan to _______ the company's stock before it went public. |
Created by:
carol2428
Popular English Vocabulary sets