Rapacious vs Insatiable - What's the difference?
rapacious | insatiable |
Voracious; avaricious.
* 1787 , :
Given to taking by force or plundering; aggressively greedy.
* 1910 , :
Subsisting off live prey.
* 1827 , :
Not satiable; incapable of being satisfied or appeased; very greedy; as, an insatiable appetite, thirst, or desire.
* 1843'' '', book 2, ch. 4, ''Abbot Hugo
* 1885 — [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZgVUqbK-_1EC&pg=PA19&dq=mikado++insatiable&sig=a932jEhYrf-l6EOJvgvNfxO6kHE]
As adjectives the difference between rapacious and insatiable
is that rapacious is voracious; avaricious while insatiable is not satiable; incapable of being satisfied or appeased; very greedy; as, an insatiable appetite, thirst, or desire.rapacious
English
Adjective
(en adjective)- To presume a want of motives for such contests [of power between states] as an argument against their existence, would be to forget that men are ambitious, vindictive, and rapacious .
- A Prince [...] sooner becomes hated by being rapacious and by interfering with the property and with the women of his subjects, than in any other way.
- Even the rapacious birds appeared to comprehend the nature of the ceremony, for [...] they once more began to make their airy circuits above the place [...]
Usage notes
* The use of this term for animals other than birds is dated.Synonyms
* See alsoinsatiable
English
Adjective
(en adjective)- Hugo, in a fine frenzy, threatens to depose the Sacristan, to do this and do that; but, in the mean while, how to quiet your insatiable' Jew? Hugo, for this couple of hundreds, grants the Jew his bond for four hundred payable at the end of four years. (...) Neither yet is this ' insatiable Jew satisfied or settled with: he had papers against us of 'small debts fourteen years old;' his modest claim amounts finally to 'Twelve hundred pounds besides interest'
- Such an appointment would realize my fondest dreams. But no, at any sacrifice, I must set bounds to my insatiable ambition!