English

Etymology

    From un- + scrupulous.

    Pronunciation

    Adjective

    unscrupulous (comparative more unscrupulous, superlative most unscrupulous)

    1. Without scruples; immoral.
      • 1888, Rutherford B. Hayes, edited by Charles Richard Williams, Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes, volume IV, Ohio State Archæological and Historical Society, published 1925, page 374:
        The real difficulty is with the vast wealth and power in the hands of the few and the unscrupulous who represent or control capital.
      • 2016, Doris L. Bergen, “Flashover: The Killing Centers, 1942-1944”, in War and Genocide: A Concise History of the Holocaust, page 272:
        Nazism, they wrote, had turned German youth into godless, shameless, unscrupulous murderers.
    2. Contemptuous of what is right or honorable.

    Antonyms

    Translations