What does voracity mean?
Word: Voracity
Part of Speech: Noun
Meaning: Voracity means very great hunger or eagerness, for food or for something such as books or knowledge.
Synonyms: greed, hunger, appetite, eagerness
Antonyms: indifference
Word origin: Comes from Latin voracitas, from vorax, based on the verb vorare.
How do you spell voracity?
Syllables: vo - rac - i - ty
Tricky part: It is voracious made into a noun, so it keeps the c: vorasity is the usual slip.
Watch out for: vorasity, voracety
Memory tip: A voracious reader shows voracity: the c of the adjective stays in the noun.
Voracity in a sentence
Example 1: The hungry puppy ate with such voracity that its bowl skidded across the floor.
Example 2: Ravi reads with voracity and finishes a novel every two days.
Example 3: The locusts attacked the wheat fields with alarming voracity.
Fun Fact
Locust swarms are famous for their voracity: the UN's food agency says a swarm covering one square kilometre can eat about as much food in a day as 35,000 people.
Practise the CREST Way
Word Twins
Read the sentences and choose the correct option:
1. The teacher questioned the voracity of the newspaper report's statement. 2. The boy's voracity for comics kept the local bookshop busy.
a) both
b) only 1
c) neither
d) only 2
Show answer
d) only 2. Truthfulness is veracity, so sentence 1 needs veracity, while sentence 2 is right.
Spell Probe
Choose the meaning of the misspelt word in the given sentence:
The mynas pecked at the ripe guavas with such voracity that the gardner had to cover the tree with a net.
a) a person who looks after a garden
b) material made of threads with spaces between
c) an enormous appetite that is hard to satisfy
d) a tropical fruit with pink or white flesh
Show answer
a) a person who looks after a garden. Gardener keeps the e of garden before -er; voracity, mynas and guavas are all spelt correctly.
Back to the Roots
Voracity goes back to the Latin verb vorare, which means ___.
a) to swallow or devour
b) to sing loudly
c) to speak the truth
d) to run very fast
Show answer
a) to swallow or devour. Vorare is the eating verb behind voracious, devour and carnivore.
Word Champ
Choose the correct word for the blank:
A huge, greedy appetite for food, or for books and games, is called ____.
a) tenacity
b) audacity
c) voracity
d) sagacity
Show answer
c) voracity. Audacity is boldness, sagacity is wisdom and tenacity is determination; greedy hunger is voracity.
Multiple Choice Questions
1. A student with a voracity for knowledge ____.
a) dislikes going to school every morning
b) never asks the teacher any questions
c) forgets each lesson within a day
d) wants to learn everything possible
Show answer
d) wants to learn everything possible
2. Which of these would a nature programme describe with the word voracity?
a) a deer standing still at the edge of a pool
b) a cat dozing in the afternoon sun
c) a tortoise resting in the shade
d) a caterpillar munching through leaf after leaf
Show answer
d) a caterpillar munching through leaf after leaf
