envious
- 1Feeling or showing envy; resentfully desiring another person's possessions, success, or good fortune, sometimes with ill will toward them.
Colleagues grew envious of her rapid promotion.
He cast an envious glance at the neighbor's new car.
Similarjealous, resentful, covetous, begrudging
Note
The everyday sense, and the one the word brought into English from Old French envieus and ultimately Latin invidiōsus. It displaced the native Old English æfestiġ. Today it takes of: Keble's line of 1827, 'My soul is envious of mine eye,' already shows the modern pattern. The King James Bible of 1611 could still say 'envious against the workers of iniquity.' Its doublet invidious was borrowed straight from Latin.
- 2Malicious, spiteful, or mischievous; bearing ill will and inclined to do harm.
Each envious brier his weary legs doth scratch.
1593, [William Shakespeare], Venus and AdonisNote
Older texts use the word for plain malice, with no longing attached. Shakespeare's Venus and Adonis (1593) has 'each envious brier his weary legs doth scratch.' A thornbush cannot covet anything, but it can seem spiteful. When an Early Modern writer calls a person or thing envious, try reading it as hostile before assuming the resentful, coveting sense. In modern writing this meaning would simply be misunderstood.
- 3Arousing envy in others; so excellent or fortunate that other people covet or long for it.
He to him leapt, and that same envious gage / Of victors glory from him snatcht away.
1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie QueeneNote
Here the adjective faces the other way: it describes the prize, not the person who wants it. Spenser's The Faerie Queene (1590) calls a token of triumph 'that same envious gage / Of victors glory', meaning the thing every rival covets. The use belongs to verse and has not survived. A modern writer wanting this meaning would say enviable, since envious beauty now suggests beauty that is itself jealous.
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Origin
This word passed from Latin "invidiōsus" through Anglo-Norman and Old French "envieus" into Middle English "envious"; it is related to "envy" and is a doublet of "invidious". It replaced the native Old English "æfestiġ".