Definition of "retrograde" []

• Moving or tending backward. (adjective)
• Opposite to the usual order; inverted or reversed. (adjective)
• Reverting to an earlier or inferior condition. (adjective)
• Astronomy Of or relating to the orbital revolution or axial rotation of a planetary or other celestial body that moves clockwise from east to west, in the direction opposite to most celestial bodies. (adjective)
• Astronomy Of or relating to the brief, regularly occurring, apparently backward movement of a planetary body in its orbit as viewed against the fixed stars, caused by the differing orbital velocities of Earth and the body observed. (adjective)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "The term retrograde here is used in a purely theoretical sense, and cannot be held to imply any actual degradation."
• "When the Conservatives first came to office in 2006, then information commissioner John Reid sounded the alarm bells at what he called retrograde steps towards secrecy -- and was promptly run out of town."
• "(Like I would know what that meant, but my brother always says something about Mercury in retrograde or something when I feel over-sad.)"