provincial
adjectivenounattested in dialogue
- United States//pɹəˈvɪn(t)ʃəl//
Of or pertaining to a province.
adjective
- 1
Of or pertaining to a province.
a provincial government
a provincial dialect
More than 100 provincial and municipal firefighters were brought in, with helicopters and aircraft used to drop water and fire retardant, while bulldozers were digging firebreaks.
- 2
Constituting a province.
- 3
Exhibiting the ways or manners of a province; characteristic of the inhabitants of a province.
[…] fond of exhibiting provincial airs and graces.
- 4
Not cosmopolitan; limited in outlook; narrow; illiberal.
- 5
Not cosmopolitan; limited in outlook; narrow; illiberal. Backwoodsy, hick, yokelish, countrified; not polished; rude.
That awful little Cedar Whatever is no thriving megalopolis, and you people are so provincial, it's appalling.
- 6
Of or pertaining to an ecclesiastical province, or to the jurisdiction of an archbishop; not ecumenical.
a provincial synod
Etymology
From Middle English provincial, from Old French provincial, from Latin prōvinciālis (“of a province”), equivalent to province + -ial.
noun
- 1
A person belonging to a province; one who is provincial.
- 2
A monastic superior, who, under the general of his order, has the direction of all the religious houses of the same fraternity in a given district, called a province of the order.
The Franciscan provincial Diego de Landa set up a local Inquisition which unleashed a campaign of interrogation and torture on the Indio population.
- 3
obsoleteA constitution issued by the head of an ecclesiastical province.
Or els is thys Goddis law, Decrees or decretals, Or holy sinodals, Or els provincyals, Thus within the wals Of holy church to deale […]?
- 4
A country bumpkin.
Forms
- plural
- provincials
- comparative
- more provincial
- superlative
- most provincial