John Gregory DunneBro UttalPaul FrancisConnie Leonard GeronRebecca Haines
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What's the history of ornery?
Readers who are familiar with one of the more common senses of ornery ("irritable") might well be surprised to learn that the word is an alteration of the word ordinary, as this root word has little to do with feelings of peevishness. Yet this is the case, and there is a perfectly reasonable explanation for how this meaning came about.
Ornery was first used in American regional speech in the beginning of the 19th century as a simple variant of ordinary, and for some while it had the same meaning. Soon enough, however, it began to take on some of the more negative aspects of ordinary. It was used to describe things that were common, and especially common things of inferior quality. Next, it developed a sense synonymous with lazy. Those lazy folks dubbed "ornery" were also apparently easily annoyed and touchy. By the end of the 19th century ornery had taken on its now-common meaning of "cantankerous."
Examples of ornery in a Sentence
Lev Grossman, Time, 21 July 2003
Critics have compared his work to Faulkner's. And like Faulkner, McCarthy is an acquired taste as well as a palate cleanser. He's a stubborn, ornery writer, known for his ornate sentences, arcane vocabulary, casual disregard for standard punctuation and untranslated bits of foreign dialogue that offer little in the way of a narrative compass to guide readers along.
—Sara Mosle, New York Times Book Review, 17 May 1998
I'm getting more and more ornery in my old age.
an ornery old man who always yells at the neighborhood kids to keep off his lawn
Andrew Greif, NBC news, 22 Sep. 2025
The goal is to capitalize on the holidays when kids will be out of school and eager to see some ornery avians.
—Brent Lang, Variety, 18 Sep. 2025
That ornery cleric was Moqtada al-Sadr, the son of Mohammad Sadiq al-Sadr, a grand ayatollah assassinated almost certainly by Saddam’s order in 1999.
—Graeme Wood, The Atlantic, 2 Sep. 2025
Their aggressive, ornery, and unpredictable nature has earned them the nickname Black Death.
—Kris Millgate, Outdoor Life, 7 Aug. 2025
See All Example Sentences for ornery
Cite this Entry
“Ornery.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/ornery. Accessed 4 Nov. 2025.
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ornery
adjective
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