Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Reaching or having recently reached puberty.
  • adjective Covered with short hairs or soft down.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Arriving at puberty.
  • Covered with pubescence, or fine short hair; downy.
  • In botany, covered or sprinkled with down or hairs: a general term, including villous, hirsute, strigose, lanate, etc., but when used alone in specific description denoting a soft or downy and short pubescence.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adjective Arrived at puberty.
  • adjective Covered with pubescence, or fine short hairs, as certain insects, and the leaves of some plants.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective Arriving, or arrived at, puberty.
  • adjective botany, zoology Covered with down or fine hairs.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adjective covered with fine soft hairs or down
  • adjective (of animals especially human beings) having arrived at the onset of puberty (the age at which sex glands become functional) but not yet fully mature

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Latin pūbēscēns, pūbēscent-, present participle of pūbēscere, to reach puberty, from pūbēs, adult.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Latin pubescens ("to become hairy, downy, or an adult")

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Examples

  • Deflowering a curious and coquettish cusp-pubescent is illegal and icky at best, and, due to “ability to consent,” probably properly defined, in our modern morality, as rape.

    Matthew Yglesias » Keep it in the Family 2007

  • Post-pubescent is still UNDER AGE – STATUTORY RAPE!!

    Think Progress » Catholic League: Church Abuse Scandal Is A Crisis Of ‘Homosexuality,’ Not ‘Pedophilia’ 2010

  • BLITZER: So you're making a difference between pedophilia and what's called phebophilia (ph), which is the post-pubescent, 16 -, 15 -, 16 -, 17-year-olds as opposed to pre-pubescent, which is pedophelia.

    CNN Transcript Apr 28, 2002 2002

  • And he doesn't have that kind of pubescent depression and life looks grand.

    CNN Transcript Mar 23, 2007 2007

  • On CNN yesterday, Catholic League President William Donohue defended the assertion by pointing to a study that found that "three out of every four" of the male victims of sexual abuse by Catholic priests were "post-pubescent, meaning that it's homosexuality driven."

    AlterNet.org Main RSS Feed 2010

  • On CNN yesterday, Catholic League President William Donohue defended the assertion by pointing to a study that found that "three out of every four" of the male victims of sexual abuse by Catholic priests were "post-pubescent, meaning that it's homosexuality driven."

    AlterNet.org Main RSS Feed 2010

  • On CNN yesterday, Catholic League President William Donohue defended the assertion by pointing to a study that found that "three out of every four" of the male victims of sexual abuse by Catholic priests were "post-pubescent, meaning that it's homosexuality driven."

    AlterNet.org Main RSS Feed 2010

  • On CNN yesterday, Catholic League President William Donohue defended the assertion by pointing to a study that found that "three out of every four" of the male victims of sexual abuse by Catholic priests were "post-pubescent, meaning that it's homosexuality driven."

    AlterNet.org Main RSS Feed 2010

  • On CNN yesterday, Catholic League President William Donohue defended the assertion by pointing to a study that found that "three out of every four" of the male victims of sexual abuse by Catholic priests were "post-pubescent, meaning that it's homosexuality driven."

    AlterNet.org Main RSS Feed 2010

  • On CNN yesterday, Catholic League President William Donohue defended the assertion by pointing to a study that found that "three out of every four" of the male victims of sexual abuse by Catholic priests were "post-pubescent, meaning that it's homosexuality driven."

    AlterNet.org Main RSS Feed 2010

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