laborious

• POS: Adjective
• HYPHEN: la=bo=ri=ous

CIDE DICTIONARY

laborious, a. [L. laboriosus, fr. labor labor: cf. F. laborieux.].

•  Requiring labor, perseverance, or sacrifices; toilsome; tiresome.  [1913 Webster]

  "Dost thou love watchings, abstinence, or toil,
  Laborious virtues all? Learn these from Cato."  [1913 Webster]
•  Devoted to labor; diligent; industrious; as, a laborious mechanic.  [1913 Webster]

OXFORD DICTIONARY

laborious, adj.
1 needing hard work or toil (a laborious task).
2 (esp. of literary style) showing signs of toil; pedestrian; not fluent.

Derivative

laboriously adv. laboriousness n.

Etymology

ME f. OF laborieus f. L laboriosus (as LABOUR)

THESAURUS

laborious

Herculean, abstruse, ardent, arduous, assiduous, backbreaking, brutal, burdensome, careful, complex, critical, crushing, delicate, demanding, detailed, determined, difficile, difficult, diligent, dogged, effortful, energetic, exacting, exhausting, exhaustive, fatiguing, fervent, forced, formidable, grueling, hairy, hard, hard-earned, hard-fought, hard-working, hardworking, heavy, hefty, indefatigable, industrious, intricate, jawbreaking, killing, knotted, knotty, labored, mean, never idle, no picnic, not easy, obdurate, obstinate, onerous, operose, oppressive, overworked, painful, painstaking, persevering, persistent, ponderous, punishing, relentless, rigorous, rough, rugged, scrupulous, sedulous, set with thorns, severe, sleepless, spiny, steadfast, steady, steep, stiff, strained, strenuous, stubborn, taxing, thorny, thorough, ticklish, tireless, tiring, toilsome, tough, tricky, troublesome, unflagging, unrelenting, unremitting, unsleeping, unsparing, untiring, unwavering, unwearied, uphill, vehement, wearisome, wearying, wicked, zealous

ROGET THESAURUS

laborious

Exertion

N exertion, effort, strain, tug, pull, stress, throw, stretch, struggle, spell, spurt, spirt, stroke of work, stitch of work, a strong pull a long pull and a pull all together, dead lift, heft, gymnastics, exercise, exercitation, wear and tear, ado, toil and trouble, uphill work, hard work, warm work, harvest time, labor, work, toil, travail, manual labor, sweat of one's brow, swink, drudgery, slavery, fagging, hammering, limae labor, industry, industriousness, operoseness, operosity, trouble, pains, duty, resolution, energy, laboring, laborious, operose, elaborate, strained, toilsome, troublesome, wearisome, uphill, herculean, gymnastic, palestric, hard-working, painstaking, strenuous, energetic, hard at work, on the stretch, laboriously, lustily, pugnis et calcibus, with might and main, with all one's might, with a strong hand, with a sledge hammer, with much ado, to the best of one's abilities, totis viribus, vi et armis, manibus pedibusque, tooth and nail, unguibus et rostro, hammer and tongs, heart and soul, through thick and thin, by the sweat of one's brow, suo Marte, aide-toi le ciel t'aidera, and still be doing, never done, buen principio la mitad es hecha, cosa ben fatta e' fatta due volie, it is better to wear out than to rust out, labor omnia vincit, labor, wide as the earth, has its summit in Heaven, le travail du corps delivre des peines de l'esprit, manu forti, ora et labora.

Difficulty

N difficulty, hardness, impracticability, tough work, hard work, uphill work, hard task, Herculean task, Augean task, task of Sisyphus, Sisyphean labor, tough job, teaser, rasper, dead lift, dilemma, embarrassment, deadlock, perplexity, intricacy, entanglement, complexity, cross fire, awkwardness, delicacy, ticklish card to play, knot, Gordian knot, dignus vindice nodus, net, meshes, maze, coil, crooked path, involvement, nice point, delicate point, subtle point, knotty point, vexed question, vexata quaestio, poser, puzzle, paradox, hard nut to crack, nut to crack, bone to pick, crux, pons asinorum, where the shoe pinches, nonplus, quandary, strait, pass, pinch, pretty pass, stress, brunt, critical situation, crisis, trial, rub, emergency, exigency, scramble, scrape, hobble, slough, quagmire, hot water, hornet's nest, sea of troubles, peck of troubles, pretty kettle of fish, pickle, stew, imbroglio, mess, ado, false position, set fast, stand, standstill, deadlock, dead set, fix, horns of a dilemma, cul de sac, hitch, stumbling block, crab, curmudgeon, difficult, not easy, hard, tough, troublesome, toilsome, irksome, operose, laborious, onerous, arduous, Herculean, formidable, sooner said than done, more easily said than done, easier said than done, difficult to deal with, hard to deal with, ill-conditioned, crabbed, crabby, not to be handled with kid gloves, not made with rose water, awkward, unwieldy, unmanageable, intractable, stubborn, perverse, refractory, plaguy, trying, thorny, rugged, knotted, knotty, invious, pathless, trackless, labyrinthine, intricate, complicated, impracticable, not feasible, desperate, embarrassing, perplexing, delicate, ticklish, critical, beset with difficulties, full of difficulties, surrounded by difficulties, entangled by difficulties, encompassed with difficulties, under a difficulty, in a box, in difficulty, in hot water, in the suds, in a cleft stick, in a fix, in the wrong box, in a scrape, in deep water, in a fine pickle, in extremis, between two stools, between Scylla and Charybdis, surrounded by shoals, surrounded by breakers, surrounded by quicksands, at cross purposes, not out of the wood, reduced to straits, hard pressed, sorely pressed, run hard, pinched, put to it, straitened, hard up, hard put to it, hard set, put to one's shifts, puzzled, at a loss, at the end of one's tether, at the end of one's rope, at one's wit's end, at a nonplus, at a standstill, graveled, nonplused, nonplussed, stranded, aground, stuck fast, set fast, up a tree, at bay, aux abois, driven into a corner, driven from pillar to post, driven to extremity, driven to one's wit's end, driven to the wall, au bout de son Latin, out of one's depth, thrown out, accomplished with difficulty, hard-fought, hard-earned, with difficulty, with much ado, barely, hardly, uphill, against the stream, against the grain, d rebours, invita Minerva, in the teeth of, at a pinch, upon a pinch, at long odds, against long odds, ay there's the rub, hic labor hoc opus, things are come to a pretty pass, ab inconvenienti, ad astra per aspera, acun chemin de fleurs ne conduit a la gloire.