obstreperous

adj

Etymology: Borrowed from Latin obstreperus, first attested circa 17th c. Compare obstropulous.

1. Attended by, or making, a loud and tumultuous noise; boisterous.

   “[O]n a clear still summer evening you may hear from the battery of New York the obstreperous peals of broad-mouthed laughter of the Dutch negroes at Communipaw.”

   “This disposition his subsequent life had not tended to change in any considerable degree, though increased knowledge, with much observation, and a little reading, had rendered the gaiety of the young man a very different thing to the obstreperous mirth of the boy.”

2. Stubbornly defiant; disobedient; resistant to authority or control (whether in a noisy manner or not).

   “[W]e came to Whittingham. Thence to Newcastle, where an obstreperous horse retarded us for an hour at least.”

   “My dress was draggled, my hat had slipped back, and the kinks and curls of my obstreperous hair were something awful.”