PATRIOTIC

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does patriotic mean? 

• PATRIOTIC (adjective)
  The adjective PATRIOTIC has 1 sense:

1. inspired by love for your country

  Familiarity information: PATRIOTIC used as an adjective is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• PATRIOTIC (adjective)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Inspired by love for your country

Synonyms:

loyal; patriotic

Similar:

chauvinistic; flag-waving; jingoistic; nationalistic; superpatriotic; ultranationalistic (fanatically patriotic)

Also:

loyal (steadfast in allegiance or duty)

Antonym:

unpatriotic (showing lack of love for your country)

Derivation:

patriotism (love of country and willingness to sacrifice for it)

 Context examples 

Arthur was the most single-minded, chivalrous, patriotic man upon earth.

(His Last Bow, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

He did not know that the Transcontinental had been staggering along precariously for years, that it was a fourth-rater, or tenth-rater, without standing, with a crazy circulation that partly rested on petty bullying and partly on patriotic appealing, and with advertisements that were scarcely more than charitable donations.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

After the removal of the cloth, and the singing of Non Nobis (beautifully executed, and in which we were at no loss to distinguish the bell-like notes of that gifted amateur, WILKINS MICAWBER, ESQUIRE, JUNIOR), the usual loyal and patriotic toasts were severally given and rapturously received.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

He certainly did add 'spirit' to the meetings, and 'a tone' to the paper, for his orations convulsed his hearers and his contributions were excellent, being patriotic, classical, comical, or dramatic, but never sentimental.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

I have always held, too, that pistol practice should be distinctly an open-air pastime; and when Holmes, in one of his queer humours, would sit in an armchair with his hair-trigger and a hundred Boxer cartridges, and proceed to adorn the opposite wall with a patriotic V. R. done in bullet-pocks, I felt strongly that neither the atmosphere nor the appearance of our room was improved by it.

(The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)