fragmentary

[frag-muhn-ter-ee]

adjective

1. consisting of or reduced to fragments; broken; disconnected; incomplete.

   fragmentary evidence; fragmentary remains.

fragmentary

/ ˈfræɡməntərɪ, -trɪ /

adjective

1. Also: fragmental. made up of fragments; disconnected; incomplete

Other Word Forms

• fragmentarily adverb
• fragmentariness noun

Word History and Origins

Origin of fragmentary¹

First recorded in 1605–15; fragment + -ary

Example Sentences

First published in the New Yorker, “The Wife on Ambien” is a fragmentary, oddly compelling riff on marriage.

From Los Angeles Times

They show fragmentary urban scenes — a few palm trees illuminated by the glow of an unseen automobile’s headlights, the artist’s bland backyard, some mute shops — but the images aren’t compelling.

From Los Angeles Times

Debord’s genius was in seeing that world in its totality and not in the fragmentary form in which it wants to be seen.

From Salon

But Almodóvar found, on reading the pieces he has collected, that they amount to “a fragmentary autobiography, incomplete and a little cryptic.”

From Los Angeles Times

What is about to happen will very likely be even more damaging, as we move from fragmentary news reporting into the realm of speculation, name-calling, finger-pointing, conspiracy theory and half-baked political forecasting.

From Salon

Related Words

• scattered 
• sketchy 

When To Use

What does fragmentary mean?

The adjective fragmentary means consisting of or reduced to fragments—pieces that have been broken off of or detached from something else.The fossilized remains of a dinosaur might be described as fragmentary if they exist in many different pieces, and perhaps some of the pieces are missing.The word fragment is also used to refer to a part or portion of something that is incomplete or isolated from the whole, such as a fragment of a movie or piece of music. Sometimes, fragmentary is used to describe things as disjointed, disconnected, or incomplete. This sense of the word is most commonly used to describe intangible or abstract things, as in fragmentary evidence or a fragmentary proposal.  The adjective fragmental can be used to mean the same thing as fragmentary.The adjective fragmented describes things that have been broken into fragments or things that are or have been disorganized or disunified in some way, such as an empire that was once unified but is now fragmented.Example: Scholars have been able to piece together the text from the fragmentary remains of the ancient parchment.