a dissolute person; usually a man who is morally unrestrained
<noun.person> [ adj ]
unrestrained by convention or morality
<adj.all> Congreve draws a debauched aristocratic society deplorably dissipated and degraded riotous living fast women
Libertine \Lib"er*tine\ (-t[i^]n), n. [L. libertinus freedman, from libertus one made free, fr. liber free: cf. F. libertin. See {Liberal}.] 1. (Rom. Antiq.) A manumitted slave; a freedman; also, the son of a freedman.
2. (Eccl. Hist.) One of a sect of Anabaptists, in the fifteenth and early part of the sixteenth century, who rejected many of the customs and decencies of life, and advocated a community of goods and of women.
3. One free from restraint; one who acts according to his impulses and desires; now, specifically, one who gives rein to lust; a rake; a debauchee.
Like a puffed and reckless libertine, Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads. --Shak.
4. A defamatory name for a freethinker. [Obsolescent]
Libertine \Lib"er*tine\, a. [L. libertinus of a freedman: cf. F. libertin. See {Libertine}, n. ] 1. Free from restraint; uncontrolled. [Obs.]
You are too much libertine. --Beau. & Fl.
2. Dissolute; licentious; profligate; loose in morals; as, libertine principles or manners. --Bacon.
He shows too many pangs of conscience, too much gentlemanly courtesy, to rank as a libertine. Sensuality is in short supply, not least in the Serenade and there is no sign of debauchery.
There is only one way for Madonna to go; like many a medieval libertine she will no doubt end up in some religious cloister, finally living up up to her name.
The book has created a literary controversy because it deals with a sensitive subject and because of its demythologizing portrayal of the man known as "the Liberator" as a foul-mouthed libertine.