truculence

/ˈtrʌkjələns/

Other forms: truculences

If you get into fights all of the time, you might be accused of truculence and sent for anger management classes. Truculence is showing a fierce kind of aggression.

If your basketball team wins a game by sheer truculence, it means that they win not by skill or talent, but by playing with ferocious aggression. It would be a dirty win, one with lots of fouls and thrown elbows. Truculence comes from the Latin word for trux meaning "fierce or wild."

Definitions of truculence

1. noun

   obstreperous and defiant aggressiveness
   synonyms: truculency

   type of:

   aggressiveness, belligerence, pugnacity

   a natural disposition to be hostile