debility

English

Etymology

From Middle English debylite, from Old French debilité (French débilité), from Latin dēbilitās (“weakness”), from dēbilis (“weak”), from dē- + habilis (“able”).

Pronunciation

  • (UK) IPA(key): /dɪˈbɪlɪti/
  • Audio (Southern England):(file)
  • Rhymes: -ɪlɪti

Noun

debility (countable and uncountable, plural debilities)

  1. A state of physical or mental weakness.
    • 1618, Patri[c]k Anderson, The Colde Spring of Kinghorne Craig […], Edinburgh: Thomas Finlason, unnumbered page:
      […] and is the onlie laſt remedie for all debilities which haue long vexed the body through a hote diſtemper of the Lever, ſuch as a hote Gutte; it allayeth all Inflamations inward & outward.
    • 1816 June – 1817 April/May (date written), [Mary Shelley], Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), London: […] [Macdonald and Son] for Lackington, Hughes, Harding, Mavor, & Jones, published 1 January 1818, →OCLC:
      As I was in a state of extreme debility, I resolved to sail directly towards the town, as a place where I could most easily procure nourishment.
      […]
      I was ready to sink from fatigue and hunger, but being surrounded by a crowd, I thought it politic to rouse all my strength, that no physical debility might be construed into apprehension or conscious guilt.
    • 1886, Robert Louis Stephenson, The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde:
      I was struck besides with the shocking expression of his face, with his remarkable combination of great muscular activity and great apparent debility of constitution
    • 1950, Norman Lindsay, Dust or Polish?, Sydney: Angus and Robertson, page 43:
      At the mention of money Mrs Dibble was overcome with great debility, and wheezed, "I don't feel up to talking about money, matters just now, dearie. I think I better have a bit of a doze."
    • 1978 [1976], Leszek Kołakowski, translated by P[aul] S[teven] Falla, Main Currents of Marxism, volume I: The Founders, Oxford: Clarendon Press, →ISBN, →OCLC, page 373, translation of Główne nurty marksizmu: powstanie (in Polish):
      […] for how could a class that was kept in a state of ignorance and debility, humiliated, illiterate, and condemned to exhausting labour, find the strength to bring about a universal revolution and restore the lost humanity of mankind?

Translations

Further reading

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