suspicious

From Old French sospecious, from Latin suspiciosus, suspitiosus.

• IPA^(key): /səˈspɪʃ.əs/

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• Rhymes: -ɪʃəs

suspicious (comparative more suspicious, superlative most suspicious)

1. Arousing suspicion.

   Synonym: questionable

   His suspicious behaviour brought him to the attention of the police.

   • 1957, H. E. Bates, Death of a Huntsman:

     If their views were entrancing their sanitation was primeval; if they possessed stables they were also next to the gas-works; if their gardens were delightful there were odours suspicious of mice in the bedrooms.

2. Distrustful or tending to suspect.

   Synonym: doubtful ; Antonym: unsuspecting

   I have a suspicious attitude to get-rich-quick schemes.

   • c. 1587–1588, [Christopher Marlowe], Tamburlaine the Great. […] The First Part […], 2nd edition, part 1, London: […] [R. Robinson for] Richard Iones, […], published 1592, →OCLC; reprinted as Tamburlaine the Great (A Scolar Press Facsimile), Menston, Yorkshire, London: Scolar Press, 1973, →ISBN, Act III, scene ii:

     Betraide by fortune and ſuſpitious loue,
     Threatned with frowning wrath and iealouſie,
     Surpriz’d with feare and hideous reuenge,
     I ſtand agaſt: […]

3. Expressing suspicion

   She gave me a suspicious look.

• non-suspicious, nonsuspicious
• suspiciously
• suspiciousness
• sus

• suspect
• suspicion
• unsuspecting

• odd
• strange