Rude Meaning
/ɹuːd/Definition, CEFR level A2, pronunciation, examples, and quiz.
Listen pronunciation
Definition
adjLacking in refinement or civility; bad-mannered; discourteous.
adjLacking refinement or skill; untaught; ignorant; raw.
Sentence Examples
How rude of you!
Aren't you being very rude?
He made a rude gesture at the driver of the other car.
CEFR Practice Quiz
It was very ____ of him to interrupt the teacher during the lecture.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
It was considered ____ to interrupt someone while they were speaking in that culture.
Word Origin & History
From Middle English rude, from Old French rude, ruide, from Latin rudis (“rough, raw, rude, wild, untilled”).
Literary Quotations & Historical Citations
"Art thou thus bolden'd, man, by thy distress?
Or else a rude despiser of good manners,
That in civility thou seem'st so empty?"
— c. 1598–1600 (date written), William Shakespeare, “As You Like It”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene vii]:
"[S]he was rude to Sir James sometimes; but he is so kind, he never noticed it."
— 1871–1872, George Eliot [pseudonym; Mary Ann Evans], chapter 6, in Middlemarch […], volume (please specify |volume=I to IV), Edinburgh; London: William Blackwood and Sons, →OCLC, book (please specify |book=I to VIII):
"But though I be rude in speech, yet not in knowledge"
— 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, 2 Corinthians 11:6:
"Though not as shee with Bow and Quiver armd,
But with such Gardning Tools as Are yet rude,
Guiltless of fire had formd, or Angels brought […]"
— 1667, John Milton, “Book VIII”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC:
"It might be apprehended, that among rude nations, where the means of subsistence are procured with so much difficulty, the mind could never raise itself above the consideration of this subject"
— 1767, Adam Ferguson, An Essay on the History of Civil Society:
Explore More A2 Vocabulary Words
CEFR Practice Quiz
It was very ____ of him to interrupt the teacher during the lecture.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
It was considered ____ to interrupt someone while they were speaking in that culture.