tough
Listen:Concise Oxford English Dictionary © 2008 Oxford University Press:
tough/tʌf/
▶adjective
- 1 strong enough to withstand wear and tear.
■ (of food, especially meat) difficult to cut or chew.
- 2 able to endure hardship, adversity, or pain.
■ involving considerable difficulty or hardship.
- 3 strict and uncompromising.
- 4 rough or violent.
- 5 used to express a lack of sympathy: if you don't like it, tough.
– phrases
tough it out informal endure a period of hardship or difficulty.
tough shit (or titty) vulgar slang used to express a lack of sympathy.
tough it out informal endure a period of hardship or difficulty.
tough shit (or titty) vulgar slang used to express a lack of sympathy.
– derivatives
toughish adjective,
toughly adverb,
toughness noun.
toughish adjective,
toughly adverb,
toughness noun.
– origin OE tōh, of Gmc origin.
'tough' also found in these Oxford entries:
armour
- avocado
- badass
- bark
- Bedford cord
- bladderwrack
- bruiser
- byssus
- case-harden
- cheat grass
- cookie
- core
- corpus callosum
- crust
- customer
- cyst
- dura mater
- gemmule
- going
- gristle
- gritty
- gutta-percha
- hang
- hard
- hardbitten
- hard-boiled
- hard case
- hardened
- hard-headed
- hard-nosed
- hard nut
- hickory
- hornbeam
- India paper
- integument
- kelp
- knapweed
- kurrajong
- lancewood
- larch
- leatherjacket
- leathery
- ligament
- limber pine
- lucite
- mama
- mild steel
- monkey puzzle
- noise
- nut
