rapacious
adjUK, US /ɹəˈpeɪ.ʃəs/
Etymology Perhaps from rapacity + -ous, in any case ultimately from Latin rapāx (“grasping, greedy”) + -acious.
1
Also, Figuratively Voracious; avaricious.
- To presume a want of motives for such contests [of power between states] as an argument against their existence, would be to forget that men are ambitious, vindictive, and rapacious.1787, Alexander Hamilton, Federalist No. 6: Concerning Dangers from Dissensions Between the States:
- Relations between the Waveney Valley Railway and the E.C.R. [Eastern Counties Railway] soon became strained, because of the rapacious attitude adopted by the latter, and to the mismanagement which it displayed in working the smaller company's line.1952 June, B. D. J. Walsh, “The Waveney Valley Line”, in Railway Magazine, page 365:
2 more examples
- Big Tech companies, on the other hand, have proven themselves to be rapacious capitalists—they take as much as they can and ask for permission later.2021 March 16, Noam Cohen, “Wikipedia Is Finally Asking Big Tech to Pay Up”, in Wired, →ISSN:
- The rapacious maw of our despair2022, “Nevermore”, performed by Lamb of God:
2
Given to taking by force or plundering; aggressively greedy.
- A Prince […] sooner becomes hated by being rapacious and by interfering with the property and with the women of his subjects, than in any other way.1910, Niccolò Machiavelli, “Chapter XIX”, in Ninian Hill Thomson, transl., The Prince:
3
Of an animal Subsisting off live prey.
- Even the rapacious birds appeared to comprehend the nature of the ceremony, for […] they once more began to make their airy circuits above the place[…]1827, James Fenimore Cooper, “Chapter XIII”, in The Prairie:
- Derived terms
- unrapacious
- Related terms
- rapaciously, rapaciousness, rapacity