Definition of ECCENTRIC

: a person who behaves in odd or unusual ways : an eccentric person

: a mechanical device consisting of an eccentric (see eccentric entry 1 sense 2b) disk communicating its motion to a rod so as to produce reciprocating motion

strange, singular, unique, peculiar, eccentric, erratic, odd, quaint, outlandish mean departing from what is ordinary, usual, or to be expected.

strange stresses unfamiliarity and may apply to the foreign, the unnatural, the unaccountable.

a journey filled with strange sights

a singular feeling of impending disaster

a career unique in the annals of science

the peculiar status of America's First Lady

the eccentric eating habits of preschoolers

a friend's suddenly erratic behavior

outlandish fashions of the time

Adjective

It was Charles Darwin's eccentric mathematician cousin Francis Galton who in 1874 ignited the nature-nurture controversy.  … —Matt Ridley, Time, 2 June 2003 Eccentric drifters that normally roam the farthest reaches of the solar system, these daredevils fly so close to the Sun that they pass through its scorching corona. —Maggie McKee, Astronomy, December 2002 In the spit-and-polish Navy, he and his equally unkempt colleagues were regarded as eccentric. —David M. Kennedy, Atlantic, March 1999

He was a kind but eccentric man. She's become more eccentric over the years. Noun

It wasn't until she [Mother Teresa] had set up a leprosarium outside Calcutta on land provided by the government that I began to see her as an idealist rather than an eccentric. —Bharati Mukherjee, Time, 14 June 1999 To his own townspeople Thoreau was a radical and an eccentric, a man without a vocation, supporting himself doing odd jobs, devoting himself to what seemed to them inconsequential rambles, and living like a hermit on the shores of Walden Pond. —Maxine Kumin, In Deep, 1987 But Mozart was also an eccentric, brought up not as a creature of society but as a prodigious child speaking a language of sound. Mozart couldn't "handle people," as one former friend put it. —Edward Rothstein, New York Times Book Review, 31 Oct. 1982

an eccentric who designed his house to look like a Scottish castle

Recent Examples on the Web

But every character involved has a charmingly eccentric quirk—an eye patch, an obsession with drapes, an ever-present log, an affinity for doughnuts and cherry pie. —Emma Stefansky, The Atlantic, 22 Jan. 2025 My entire childhood, I was surrounded by all of the beautiful, eccentric people who lived in this city. —Allure Editors, Allure, 17 Jan. 2025

My dedication, to help the waifs and strays and eccentrics of the music world together, continues to this day. —Andy Greene, Rolling Stone, 11 Oct. 2024 Robert Redford delivers folksy wisdom as a local eccentric who once had his own dragon encounter, and even Karl Urban’s greedy logger is more of a nuisance than an outright villain. —Josh Bell, Vulture, 20 Dec. 2024 See all Example Sentences for eccentric 

Etymology

Adjective

borrowed from Medieval Latin ecentricus, excentricus "not concentric with another circle, (of a planetary orbit in Ptolemaic astronomy) not having the earth exactly at its center," from Late Latin eccentros, eccentrus "not having the earth at its center" (borrowed from Greek ékkentros, from ek- ec- + -kentros, adjective derivative of kéntron "sting, goad, point, stationary point of a pair of compasses, midpoint of a circle or sphere") + Latin -icus -ic entry 1 — more at center entry 1

Noun

Middle English excentryke "planetary orbit of which the earth is not the center," borrowed from Medieval Latin excentricus, noun derivative of ecentricus, excentricus "(of a planetary orbit in Ptolemaic astronomy) not having the earth exactly at its center" — more at eccentric entry 1

First Known Use

Adjective

1642, in the meaning defined at sense 2a

Noun

1827, in the meaning defined at sense 2

Time Traveler

The first known use of eccentric was in 1642