voluminous

English

Etymology

From Late Latin voluminosus, from volumen, from volvō (“roll, turn about”) +‎ -men (noun-forming suffix). Related to volume.

Pronunciation

  • (UK) IPA(key): /vəˈl(j)uː.mɪ.nəs/
  • Audio (Southern England):(file)
  • (US) IPA(key): /vəˈlu.mə.nəs/

Adjective

voluminous (comparative more voluminous, superlative most voluminous)

  1. Of or pertaining to volume or volumes.
  2. Consisting of many folds, coils, or convolutions.
    • 1867, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, chapter VI, in The Gambler, translated by C. J. Hogarth‎[1]:
      I remember that the Baroness was clad in a voluminous silk dress, pale grey in colour, and adorned with flounces and a crinoline and train.
    • 1869, Alfred Russel Wallace, The Malay Archipelago, volume I, London: Macmillan and Co., page 211:
      Like the Cuscus of the Moluccas, the Galeopithecus feeds chiefly on leaves, and possesses a very voluminous stomach and long convoluted intestines. The brain is very small, and the animal possesses such remarkable tenacity of life, that it is exceedingly difficult to kill it by any ordinary means.
  3. Of great volume, or bulk; large.
    Synonym: capacious
    • 1749, Henry Fielding, The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling, volume (please specify |volume=I to VI), London: A[ndrew] Millar, […], →OCLC:
      Matters of a much more extraordinary kind are to be the subject of this history, or I should grossly mis-spend my time in writing so voluminous a work […]
    • 1978 [1976], Leszek Kołakowski, translated by P[aul] S[teven] Falla, Main Currents of Marxism, volume III: The Breakdown, Oxford: Clarendon Press, →ISBN, →OCLC, page 254, translation of Główne nurty marksizmu: rozkład (in Polish):
      Lukács's voluminous works are devoted for the most part to questions of aesthetics and literary criticism; but it would be wrong to say that he was a critic first and foremost and a philosopher only in a lesser degree.
  4. Having written much, or produced many volumes.
    Synonyms: copious, diffuse
    a voluminous writer

Derived terms

Translations

See also

  • volumous
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