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FASTIDIOUS
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I. (adjective)
Sense 1
Meaning:
Giving careful attention to detail; hard to please; excessively concerned with cleanliness
Example:
fastidious about personal cleanliness
Classified under:
Similar:
choosey; choosy (difficult to please)
dainty; nice; overnice; prissy; squeamish (excessively fastidious and easily disgusted)
finical; finicky; fussy; particular; picky (exacting especially about details)
meticulous (marked by extreme care in treatment of details)
pernickety; persnickety (characterized by excessive precision and attention to trivial details)
old-maidish; old-womanish (primly fastidious)
Also:
refined ((used of persons and their behavior) cultivated and genteel)
tidy (marked by order and cleanliness in appearance or habits)
Antonym:
unfastidious (marked by an absence of due or proper care or attention to detail; not concerned with cleanliness)
Derivation:
fastidiousness (the trait of being meticulous about matters of taste or style)
Sense 2
Meaning:
Having complicated nutritional requirements; especially growing only in special artificial cultures
Example:
certain highly specialized xerophytes are extremely exacting in their requirements
Synonyms:
exacting; fastidious
Classified under:
Domain category:
microbiology (the branch of biology that studies microorganisms and their effects on humans)
Antonym:
unfastidious (not exacting in nutritional requirements)
Context examples:
There was excellent wild-duck shooting in the fens, remarkably good fishing, a small but select library, taken over, as I understood, from a former occupant, and a tolerable cook, so that he would be a fastidious man who could not put in a pleasant month there.
(The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
It was slow work, fastidious and delicate, and Martin did not learn it so readily.
(Martin Eden, by Jack London)
"My sister Beth is a very fastidious girl, when she likes to be," said Amy, well pleased at Beth's success.
(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)
He was at the same time haughty, reserved, and fastidious, and his manners, though well-bred, were not inviting.
(Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen)
I was no vocalist myself, and, in his fastidious judgment, no musician, either; but I delighted in listening when the performance was good.
(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)
She is fastidious.
(Persuasion, by Jane Austen)
That Marianne, fastidious as she was, thoroughly acquainted with Mrs. Jennings' manners, and invariably disgusted by them, should overlook every inconvenience of that kind, should disregard whatever must be most wounding to her irritable feelings, in her pursuit of one object, was such a proof, so strong, so full, of the importance of that object to her, as Elinor, in spite of all that had passed, was not prepared to witness.
(Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen)
Herself fastidious and timid, she never awakened to the perilous trend of their intercourse.
(Martin Eden, by Jack London)
"Now, Laurie, don't be too fastidious and worldly-minded. If they love one another it doesn't matter a particle how old they are nor how poor. Women never should marry for money..." Amy caught herself up short as the words escaped her, and looked at her husband, who replied, with malicious gravity... Certainly not, though you do hear charming girls say that they intend to do it sometimes.
(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)
