SUPINE

supine

(adjective) passive as a result of indolence or indifference; “No other colony showed such supine, selfish helplessness in allowing her own border citizens to be mercilessly harried”- Theodore Roosevelt

supine, resupine

(adjective) lying face upward

Source: WordNet® 3.1

Etymology

Adjective

supine (comparative more supine, superlative most supine)

Lying on its back.

Synonym: reclined

Antonyms: prone, prostrate

(figuratively) Reluctant to take action due to indifference or moral weakness; apathetic or passive towards something.

Synonyms: passive, peaceful, lazy, lethargic, listless

(rare, now, poetic) Inclining or leaning backward; inclined, sloping.

Synonyms: inclined, sloping

Antonyms

• nonsupine

Noun

supine (plural supines)

(grammar, also, attributively) In Latin and other languages: a type of verbal noun used in the ablative and accusative cases, which shares the same stem as the passive participle.

(grammar, also, attributively) In Swedish: a verb form that combines with an inflection of ha to form the present perfect and pluperfect tenses.

Anagrams

• puisne, punies

Source: Wiktionary

Su*pine", a. Etym: [L. supinus, akin to sub under, super above. Cf. Sub-, Super-.]

1. Lying on the back, or with the face upward; -- opposed to prone.

2. Leaning backward, or inclining with exposure to the sun; sloping; inclined. If the vine On rising ground be placed, or hills supine. Dryden.

3. Negligent; heedless; indolent; listless. He became pusillanimous and supine, and openly exposed to any temptation. Woodward.

Syn.

– Negligent; heedless; indolent; thoughtless; inattentive; listless; careless; drowsy.

– Su*pine"ly, adv.

– Su*pine"ness, n.

Su"pine, n. Etym: [L. supinum (sc. verbum), from supinus bent or thrown backward, perhaps so called because, although furnished with substantive case endings, it rests or falls back, as it were, on the verb: cf. F. supin.] (Lat. Gram.)

Definition: A verbal noun; or (according to C.F.Becker), a case of the infinitive mood ending in -um and -u, that in -um being sometimes called the former supine, and that in -u the latter supine.

Source: Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary 1913 Edition