Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- adjective Suspicious or distrustful; wary.
from The Century Dictionary.
- Empty, in any sense: as, a leery cart; to be leery and tired.
- Knowing; wide-awake; sly: as, the leery man.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- adjective
Cautious ,hesitant , ornervous about something; havingreservations orconcerns .
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- adjective openly distrustful and unwilling to confide
Etymologies
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
Support
Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word leery.
Examples
-
Yet Republicans remain leery of the growing Democratic push for a second economic stimulus program to be considered in September, worried that Democrats are trying to corner them with a politically appealing proposal right before the elections.
Congress Moves Toward Approving Housing Bill - The Caucus Blog - NYTimes.com 2008
-
Yet Republicans remain leery of the growing Democratic push for a second economic stimulus program to be considered in September, worried that Democrats are trying to corner them with a politically appealing proposal right before the elections.
Congress Moves Toward Approving Housing Bill - The Caucus Blog - NYTimes.com 2008
-
Many businesses remain leery of putting their applications and data on servers they don’t control, for example.
Google Goes After Another Microsoft Cash Cow - Bits Blog - NYTimes.com 2008
-
Many businesses remain leery of putting their applications and data on servers they don’t control, for example.
Google Goes After Another Microsoft Cash Cow - Bits Blog - NYTimes.com 2008
-
RANDY STRICKER, THOMSON RESIDENT: I'm kind of leery a little bit, I guess.
-
But every deliver guy was kind of leery about thiss fellow.
-
Donald Birger, president of InstaCredit Automart, which sold more than 3,000 vehicles in 2008 through its two dealerships in Collinsville, Ill., and O'Fallon, Mo., says he initially was "leery" of the remote disabling systems, in part because he thought customers might object.
-
But I ` m really kind of leery about making -- him making bond.
-
U.S. Deputy Ambassador Alejandro Wolff said he was "leery" about blaming Ethiopia for what is primarily an internal Somali problem.
-
In the same article linked to above, Environment Minister Leona Dombrowsky said that she's "leery" about incineration and approves of composting.
Peace, order and good government, eh?: October 2003 Archives 2003
oroboros commented on the word leery
Contronymic in the sense: aggressive (especially sexually) vs. cautious.
January 27, 2007
Prolagus commented on the word leery
Song quotation on verbose.
August 20, 2009