Voraginous

Part of speech: adjective

Definitions

1. marked by an excessive and insatiable longing for consumption or destruction that engulfs everything surrounding it
2. exhibiting a ravenous and compulsive drive to devour or obliterate all that one encounters in pursuit of fulfillment
3. Having an intense and unquenchable appetite that seems to swallow all in its path

Etymology: "Voraginous" is a learned English adjective borrowed from Latin "vorāginōsus", which describes something full of chasms or whirlpools. That Latin adjective is built on "vorāgō", meaning "abyss" or "gulf", a noun related to "vorāre", "to devour" or "to swallow whole". The English word therefore carries the idea of a gaping pit within its own roots: what it describes is something that seems to take in everything around it. The Latin "-osus" ending, which means "full of" or "having much of", is the same suffix found in English words such as "famous" and "gracious". Put together, the parts give a literal sense of "full of abysses" or "full of gulfs", which English writers then extended from physical pits to appetites and hungers. The result is a word that sounds more like a description of a whirlpool than of a person's greed, and its meaning follows that imagery closely.

Synonyms: gluttonous, insatiable, ravenous, greedy, devouring

Antonyms: satisfied, full, restrained, moderate