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anal-retentive

adj

Etymology

From anal + retentive. First use appears c. 1936 in the writings of Marjorie Brierley.

  1. derived from retentus
  2. derived from retentivus
  3. derived from retentif
  4. borrowed from rétentif
  5. compounded as anal-retentive — “anal + retentive”

Definitions

  1. Preoccupied with achieving perfection, order and control and with collecting, possessing,…

    Preoccupied with achieving perfection, order and control and with collecting, possessing, and retaining objects.

  2. Overly obsessive concerning small details.

The neighborhood

Derived

anal-retentiveness

Vish — recursive loop

No curated loop yet for anal-retentive. Loops are being traced one word at a time while the ingestion pipeline matures.

sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA