Usually means: Intended to punish; harsh, penal.
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We found 31 dictionaries that define the word punitive:

General (27 matching dictionaries)
  1. punitive: Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
  2. punitive: Merriam-Webster
  3. punitive: Oxford Learner's Dictionaries
  4. punitive: American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language
  5. punitive: Collins English Dictionary
  6. punitive: Vocabulary.com
  7. Punitive, punitive: Wordnik
  8. punitive: Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary
  9. punitive: Wiktionary
  10. punitive: Webster's New World College Dictionary, 4th Ed.
  11. punitive: The Wordsmyth English Dictionary-Thesaurus
  12. punitive: Infoplease Dictionary
  13. punitive: Dictionary.com
  14. punitive: Online Etymology Dictionary
  15. punitive: Cambridge Essential American English Dictionary
  16. Punitive: Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia
  17. Punitive: Online Plain Text English Dictionary
  18. punitive: Webster's Revised Unabridged, 1913 Edition
  19. punitive: Rhymezone
  20. Punitive: AllWords.com Multi-Lingual Dictionary
  21. punitive: Webster's 1828 Dictionary
  22. punitive: FreeDictionary.org
  23. punitive: Mnemonic Dictionary
  24. punitive: TheFreeDictionary.com
  25. punitive: Wikimedia Commons US English Pronunciations

Business (3 matching dictionaries)
  1. punitive: Merriam-Webster Legal Dictionary
  2. Glossary of Legal Terms (No longer online)
  3. punitive: Legal dictionary

Medicine (1 matching dictionary)
  1. punitive: Medical dictionary

(Note: See punitively as well.)

Definitions from Wiktionary (
)
American English Definition British English Definition
adjective:  (law, military) Inflicting punishment; punishing.

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    black,     dark red,     crimson,     maroon,     burgundy, more...



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