muscular

muscular, brawny, sinewy, athletic, burly, husky are applied to persons in the sense of strong and powerful in build or physique.

Muscular implies well-developed, but not overdeveloped, muscles and, usually, a stalwart build

{

hard exercise . .. built into a strong, muscular body what had been a frail and sickly frame— White

}

Brawny implies the full development of the muscles; it carries no connotation of fatness but rather suggests the might that is associated with hard flesh and great size

{

blond, healthy- looking fellows, with brawny, bare arms, who were approached with dread by all— Zangwill

}

{

tough, weatherruddied, brawny hunters of whales— R. L. Cook

}

Sinewy attributes no less power to the muscles than brawny, but it suggests greater energy and quickness and seldom connotes hugeness. Rather it often implies a leanness, toughness, and litheness that are the result of training or of persistent exercise; thus, such people as blacksmiths, steelworkers, stevedores, and prizefighters are often described as brawny, but fencers, runners, and acrobats, more often as sinewy

{

worthy fellows; and like to prove most sinewy swordmen— Shak.

}

Athletic as used in anthropometry denotes a particular body build marked by heavy frame, large chest, and powerful well-developed muscles. In more general use athletic may suggest much the same type, but more often it stresses fitness for athletic activity and emphasizes muscularity, sinewiness, quick reflexes, and vigor of health

{

a tall, athletic young man

}

and it is with this latter aspect that the term is usually extended to the mental life or its products imaginative skepticism and dramatic irony . . . keep the mind athletic and the spirit on the stretch— Blackmur)

{

she had tried ... to shock and startle: and yet. . . had feared to begin with Shaw's athletic wit— Yeats

}

Burly stresses massiveness of build to such an extent that it often carries con-notations of corpulence, of coarseness, or of grossness and suggests the possession of brute force

{

tall . . . burly, quite fearless, built with such a jaw that no man's rule could be his law— Masefield

}

{

a great, burly, red-faced individual, huge in frame, with a stentorian voice— Jesse

}

Husky implies a powerful athletic build and brawniness

{

the huskiest members of a football team are placed on the line

}

{

good food and leisure and heredity gave me a husky build— S. E. White

}

Analogous words: robust, *healthy, hale, sound: *strong, sturdy, stalwart, stout: *vigorous, lusty