immeritorious

im- (“un-”, “not”) + meritorious (“worthy or deserving of merit”); compare the Latin immeritōrius

• (Received Pronunciation) enPR: ĭmĕrĭtôʹrĭəs, IPA^(key): /ɪmɛɹɪˈtɔːɹɪəs/

immeritorious (comparative more immeritorious, superlative most immeritorious)

1. Unworthy of merit; not deserving of merit; not meritorious.
   • 1883, Mind, volume 8, B. Blackwell, page 24:

     Their acceptance indeed, as a formula, may show a willing and tractable spirit, and they may to that extent have a value : but such acceptance differs of course from belief in being admittedly a voluntary act, and not a mere immeritorious and reluctant yielding to the brute weight of evidence.

   • 2004: Damien Géradin, Modernisation and Enlargement: Two Major Challenges for EC Competition Law, page 137 (Intersentia; →ISBN, 9050954324)

     As long as the defence is credible and can be reasonably substantiated so that the counterclaim is not evidently immeritorious, the attacked party has little to lose, and may gain time.

• immeritoriously

• “†immeriˈtorious, a.” listed in the Oxford English Dictionary, second edition (1989)