malignant

From Middle French malignant, from Late Latin malignans. See malign.

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• IPA^(key): /məˈlɪɡnənt/

malignant (comparative more malignant, superlative most malignant)

1. Harmful, malevolent, injurious.

   malignant temper;  malignant revenge;  malignant infection

2. (medicine) Tending to produce death; threatening a fatal issue.
   • 1922, Ben Travers, chapter 1, in A Cuckoo in the Nest‎:

     “[…] the awfully hearty sort of Christmas cards that people do send to other people that they don't know at all well. You know. The kind that have mottoes […] . And then, when you see [the senders], you probably find that they are the most melancholy old folk with malignant diseases. […]”

   malignant diphtheria

   a malignant tumor

• (medicine): benign, non-malignant

• nonmalignant

malignant (plural malignants)

1. A deviant; a person who is hostile or destructive to society.
   • 1823, The Retrospective Review (volume 7, page 11)

     As devout Stephen was carried to his burial by devout men, so is it just and equal that malignants should carry malignants […]

   • 1999, National Institute of Business Management, Difficult People at Work, →ISBN, page 8:

     A malignant in a position of real power immediately becomes a tyrant.

2. (historical, derogatory, obsolete) A person who fought for Charles I in the English Civil War.

malignant

1. third-person plural present active indicative of malignō