a. [f. acquīsīt- ppl. stem of acquīrĕre (see ACQUIRE) + -IVE, as if ad. L. *acquīsītīvus.] Characterized by acquisition, Hence,
† 1. Belonging to one by acquisition; that has been, or is liable to be, acquired; acquisititious. Obs.
1637. Reliq. Wotton., 106 (1672). He died not in his Acquisitive but in his Native Soil.
1642. Fuller, Holy & Prof. State, I. xv. 48. Neither doth an apprentiship extinguish native, nor disinable to acquisitive Gentry.
2. Able, or given, to make acquisitions; acquiring.
1846. Grote, Greece, I. I. 51 (1862). The knavish, smooth-tongued, keen and acquisitive Hermês.
1865. Carlyle, Fredk. Gt., II. V. ii. 67. The sieging Turks, liberative Sobieskis, acquisitive Louis Fourteenths.
1870. Bowen, Logic, x. 316. The beginning of all knowledge is in single acts of the Perceptive or Acquisitive Faculty.