promiscuous

From Latin prōmiscuus (“mixed, not separated”), from prō (“forth”) + misceō (“mix”).

• IPA^(key): /pɹəˈmɪs.kju.əs/

• Audio (AU)

  (file)

promiscuous (comparative more promiscuous, superlative most promiscuous)

1. Made up of various disparate elements mixed together; of disorderly composition.

   Synonym: motley

   • 1667, John Milton, “Book I”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC, lines 379-80:

     Came singly where he stood on the bare strand, / While the promiscuous croud stood yet aloof.

   • 1871, George Eliot [pseudonym; Mary Ann Evans], chapter I, in Middlemarch […], volume I, Edinburgh, London: William Blackwood and Sons, →OCLC, book I, page 4:

     [T]hey had both been educated [...] on plans at once narrow and promiscuous, first in an English family and afterwards in a Swiss family at Lausanne, their bachelor uncle and guardian trying in this way to remedy the disadvantages of their orphaned condition.

2. Made without careful choice; indiscriminate.

   A sail caught by a promiscuous wind.

3. Having many sexual partners, especially if indiscriminate in choosing said sexual partners.
   • 2023, Parliament of Singapore, “Women’s Charter (Family Violence and Other Matters) (Amendment) Bill”, in Republic of Singapore Government Gazette‎, page 5:

     X spreads false rumours to third parties about X’s spouse being promiscuous. X’s spouse finds out about the rumours and is distressed. X has committed emotional or psychological abuse against X’s spouse.

4. (networking) The mode in which an NIC gathers all network traffic instead of getting only the traffic intended for it.

• promiscuity
• promiscuousness

• Thesaurus:promiscuous man
• Thesaurus:promiscuous woman

• “promiscuous”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• “promiscuous”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.
• “promiscuous”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.