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rankness

   Also found in: Medical, Legal, Idioms, Encyclopedia, Wikipedia, Hutchinson 0.03 sec.
rank 1  (rngk)
n.
1.
a. A relative position in a society.
b. An official position or grade: the rank of sergeant.
c. A relative position or degree of value in a graded group.
d. High or eminent station or position: persons of rank.
2. A row, line, series, or range.
3.
a. A line of soldiers, vehicles, or equipment standing side by side in close order.
b. ranks The armed forces.
c. ranks Personnel, especially enlisted military personnel.
4. ranks A body of people classed together; numbers: joined the ranks of the unemployed.
5. Games Any of the rows of squares running crosswise to the files on a playing board in chess or checkers.
v. ranked, rank·ing, ranks
v.tr.
1. To place in a row or rows.
2. To give a particular order or position to; classify.
3. To outrank or take precedence over.
v.intr.
1. To hold a particular rank: ranked first in the class.
2. To form or stand in a row or rows.
3. Slang
a. To complain.
b. To engage in carping criticism. Often used with on: Stop ranking on me all the time.
Idiom:
pull rank
To use one's superior rank to gain an advantage.

[Middle English, line, row, from Old French ranc, renc, of Germanic origin; see sker-2 in Indo-European roots.]

rank 2  (rngk)
adj. rank·er, rank·est
1. Growing profusely or with excessive vigor: rank vegetation in the jungle.
2. Yielding a profuse, often excessive crop; highly fertile: rank earth.
3. Strong and offensive in odor or flavor.
4. Conspicuously offensive: rank treachery. See Synonyms at flagrant.
5. Absolute; complete: a rank amateur; a rank stranger.

[Middle English ranc, from Old English, strong, overbearing; see reg- in Indo-European roots.]

rankly adv.
rankness n.
ThesaurusLegend:  Synonyms Related Words Antonyms
Noun1.rankness - the property of producing abundantly and sustaining vigorous and luxuriant growth; "he praised the richness of the soil"; "weeds lovely in their rankness"
fruitfulness, fecundity - the quality of something that causes or assists healthy growth
2.rankness - the attribute of having a strong offensive smell
aroma, odor, olfactory property, odour, smell, scent - any property detected by the olfactory system
B.O., body odor, body odour - malodorousness resulting from a failure to bathe
Translations
rankness [ˈræŋknɪs] N
1. (Bot) → exuberancia f
2. (= bad smell) → mal olor m
3. [of injustice] → enormidad f
rankness
n
(of plants)Üppigkeit f; (of grass)Verwildertheit f; (of soil)Überwucherung f
(of smell)Übelkeit f; (of dustbin, drain)Gestank m, → Stinken nt; (of person)Derbheit f, → Vulgarität f


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At first the impression is an unpleasant one, but a couple of minutes will suffice to dissipate it, for the reason that EVERYTHING here smells--people's clothes, hands, and everything else--and one grows accustomed to the rankness.
It was two hours, owing to sundry wrong turnings, ere she found herself on a summit commanding the long-sought-for vale, the Valley of the Great Dairies, the valley in which milk and butter grew to rankness, and were produced more profusely, if less delicately, than at her home--the verdant plain so well watered by the river Var or Froom.
The very rankness of the smell of manure in the clear sweet air awoke something heady in his brain.
 
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