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ingenuity

[in-juh-noo-i-tee, -nyoo-]

Origin

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noun, plural -ties for 3.

the quality of being cleverly inventive or resourceful; inventiveness: a designer of great ingenuity.

cleverness or skillfulness of conception or design: a device of great ingenuity.

an ingenious contrivance or device.

Obsolete. ingenuousness.

Origin:
1590–1600; < Latin ingenuitās innate virtue, etc. (see ingenuous, -ity); current senses by association with ingenious

Related forms

hy·per·in·ge·nu·i·ty, noun

su·per·in·ge·nu·i·ty, noun, plural -ties.

Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2012.
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Link To ingenuity

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Ingenuity has a plethora of syllables.

So is supercalifragilisticexpialidocious. Does it mean:

(used as a nonsense word by children to express approval or to represent the longest word in English.)

opposition to the withdrawal of state support or recognition from an established church, esp. the Anglican Church in 19th-century England.

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Collins

World English Dictionary

ingenuity (ˌɪndʒɪˈnjuːɪtɪ)

—n , pl -ties
1.	inventive talent; cleverness
2.	an ingenious device, act, etc
3.	archaic frankness; candour

[C16: from Latin ingenuitās a freeborn condition, outlook consistent with such a condition, from ingenuus native, freeborn (see ingenuous); meaning influenced by ingenious]

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 10th Edition
2009 © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009
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Etymonline

Word Origin & History

ingenuity

1598, "honor, nobility," from L. ingenuitas "condtion of a free-born man, noble-mindedness," from ingenuus (see ingenuous). Etymologically, this word belongs to ingenuous, though it was so constantly confused in meaning with ingenious (q.v.) in 17c. that its form and sense

EXPAND

now partake of that word, and with the meaning "capacity for invention or construction" (first attested 1649).

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Matching Quote

"The needs of a society determine its ethics, and in the Black American ghettos the hero is that man who is offered only the crumbs from his country's table but by ingenuity and courage is able to take for himself a Lucullan feast. Hence the janitor who lives in one room but sports a robin's-egg-blue Cadillac is not laughed at but admired, and the domestic who buys forty-dollar shoes is not criticized but is appreciated. We know that they have put to use their full mental and physical powers. Each single gain feeds into the gains of the body collective."

-Maya Angelou

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