Ingenious

ingenious
    adj 1: showing inventiveness and skill; "a clever gadget"; "the
           cunning maneuvers leading to his success"; "an ingenious
           solution to the problem" [syn: {clever}, {cunning},
           {ingenious}]
    

Ingenious \In*gen"ious\, a. [L. ingeniosus, fr. ingenium innate
   or natural quality, natural capacity, genius: cf. F.
   ing['e]nieux. See {Engine}.]
   1. Possessed of genius, or the faculty of invention; skillful
      or promp to invent; having an aptitude to contrive, or to
      form new combinations; as, an ingenious author, mechanic.
      [1913 Webster]

            A man . . . very wise and ingenious in feats of war.
                                                  --Hakluyt.
      [1913 Webster]

            Thou, king, send out
            For torturers ingenious.              --Shak.
      [1913 Webster]

            The more ingenious men are, the more apt are they to
            trouble themselves.                   --Sir W.
                                                  Temple.
      [1913 Webster]

   2. Proceeding from, pertaining to, or characterized by,
      genius or ingenuity; of curious design, structure, or
      mechanism; as, an ingenious model, or machine; an
      ingenious scheme, contrivance, etc.
      [1913 Webster]

            Thus men go wrong with an ingenious skill. --Cowper.
      [1913 Webster]

   3. Witty; shrewd; adroit; keen; sagacious; as, an ingenious
      reply.
      [1913 Webster]

   4. Mental; intellectual. [Obs.]
      [1913 Webster]

            A course of learning and ingenious studies. --Shak.
      [1913 Webster]
    

125 Moby Thesaurus words for "ingenious":
      Daedalian, Machiavellian, Machiavellic, acute, adept, adroit, apt,
      arch, artful, artistic, astute, authoritative, bravura, bright,
      brilliant, cagey, canny, clean, clever, conceptive, conceptual,
      coordinated, crack, crackerjack, crafty, creative, cunning, cute,
      daedal, deceitful, deep, deep-laid, deft, demiurgic, designing,
      dexterous, dextrous, diplomatic, esemplastic, excellent, expert,
      fancy, fecund, feline, fertile, foxy, germinal, gifted, good,
      goodish, graceful, guileful, handy, ideational, ideative,
      imaginative, innovational, innovative, insidious, inspired,
      inventive, keen, knowing, magisterial, masterful, masterly, neat,
      no mean, notional, on the ball, original, originative, pawky,
      politic, pregnant, productive, professional, proficient, prolific,
      quick, quite some, ready, resourceful, scheming, seminal,
      serpentine, shaping, sharp, shifty, shrewd, skilled, skillful,
      slick, slim, slippery, sly, smart, smooth, snaky, sneaky, some,
      sophistical, statesmanlike, stealthy, strategic, stylish, subtile,
      subtle, supple, tactful, tactical, talented, teeming, the compleat,
      the complete, trickish, tricksy, tricky, virtuoso, visioned,
      vulpine, wary, well-done, wily, workmanlike