Orcish

Part of speech: adjective

Definitions

1. Relating to or characteristic of orcs, the brutal humanoid creatures found in fantasy literature and games
2. Referring to traits and characteristics associated with an imaginary race of aggressive humanoid creatures frequently featured in mythological narratives and fantasy worlds
3. Pertaining to the qualities or features attributed to a fictional race of savage beings often depicted in mythical tales and fantasy environments

Etymology: "Orcish" is a plain formation: the noun "orc" with the suffix "-ish," meaning "like" or "characteristic of." The more surprising link is with "ogreish," which is a doublet of it, meaning the two words are separate descendants of the same ancient root that reached English by different routes. "Ogre" came into English from French, while "orc" has a more tangled path through Latin and Italian, so the pair ended up as near-relatives that developed independently. The suffix does most of the work here. "-ish" has long been attached to nouns to describe qualities or resemblance, as in "childish" or "bookish," and it can be applied to almost any noun that describes a kind of being. Adding it to "orc" produced a ready-made adjective for anything that looks, acts, or sounds like the monstrous creatures of fantasy.