em·u·lous

(ĕm′yə-ləs)

adj.

1. Eager or ambitious to equal or surpass another.

2. Characterized or prompted by a spirit of rivalry.

3. Obsolete Covetous of power or honor; envious.

[From Latin aemulus; see aim- in Indo-European roots.]

em′u·lous·ly adv.

em′u·lous·ness n.

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

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Adv.

emulously - in a competitively imitative manner; "she emulously tried to outdo her older sister"

Mentioned in

References in classic literature

The inhabitants were all doing well, it seemed and all emulously hoping to do better still, and laying out the surplus of their grains in coquetry; so that the shop fronts stood along that thoroughfare with an air of invitation, like rows of smiling saleswomen.

View in context

He engages emulously with a tradition of English Protestant disquiet over the nature of art's relation to the sacred, focusing on Herbert; he is agonistic in his ostensibly submissive dealings with the victorious Christ and Logos.

Andrew Marvell's 'The Coronet': doubleness, conversion, and meditation

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