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History of Uncouth: From Unfamiliar to Outlandish
Old English speakers used the word cūth to describe things that were familiar to them, and uncūth for the strange and mysterious. These words passed through Middle English into modern English with different spellings but the same meanings. While couth eventually dropped out of use, uncouth soldiered on. In Captain Singleton by English novelist Daniel Defoe, for example, the author refers to “a strange noise more uncouth than any they had ever heard,” while Shakespeare wrote of an “uncouth forest” in As You Like It. This “unfamiliar” sense of uncouth, however, joined couth in becoming, well, unfamiliar to most English users, giving way to the now-common meanings, “rude” and “lacking polish or grace.” The adjective couth in use today, meaning “sophisticated” or “polished,” arose at the turn of the 20th century, not from the earlier couth, but as a back-formation of uncouth, joining the ranks of other “uncommon opposites” such as kempt and gruntled.
Examples of uncouth in a Sentence
Donald Liebenson, Vulture, 14 June 2024
Some authors paint the media as an intrusive, uncouth pack of wolves.
—Mary Ann Grossmann, Twin Cities, 16 Mar. 2025
Buteau’s special isn’t as brainy, brash or uncouth as others released this year, but there’s a sweetly molten core to her routines, a sense of genuine warmth.
—Melissa Kirsch, New York Times, 28 Dec. 2024
To even suggest that not all societies wanted peace was seen as vulgar and uncouth.
—Uri Kurlianchik, National Review, 25 Feb. 2025
See All Example Sentences for uncouth
Cite this Entry
“Uncouth.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/uncouth. Accessed 18 Apr. 2025.
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