different between avidity vs cupidity

English

Etymology

From Middle English avidite, from Old French avidite (modern French avidité), from Latin avidit?s (“avidity, covetousness”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /??v?d?ti/

Noun

avidity (usually uncountable, plural avidities)

1. Greediness; strong appetite.
2. Eagerness; intenseness of desire.
   • Little disappointed, then, she turned attention to "Chat of the Social World," gossip which exercised potent fascination upon the girl's intelligence. She devoured with more avidity than she had her food those pretentiously phrased chronicles of the snobocracy […] distilling therefrom an acid envy that robbed her napoleon of all its savour.

3. (biochemistry) The measure of the synergism of the strength of individual interactions between proteins.

Synonyms

• (intenseness of desire): eagerness, alacrity, enthusiasm, liveliness

Translations

English

Etymology

From French cupidité, from Latin cupidit?s (“strong desire”), from cupidus (“keen, desirous”). Compare Cupid.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /kju??p?d?ti/

Noun

cupidity (countable and uncountable, plural cupidities)

1. Extreme greed, especially for wealth.
   • 1857, Anthony Trollope, Barchester Towers, Volume the First, page 11 ?ISBN

     His affairs, however, were not allowed to subside thus quietly, and people were quite as much inclined to talk about the disinterested sacrifice he had made, as they had before been to upbraid him for his cupidity.

   • 1982, Lawrence Durrell, Constance, Faber & Faber 2004 (Avignon Quintet), p. 784:

     It was easy to dissimulate and disperse these modest purchases in such a way as not to excite the cupidity of any passing patrols.

Synonyms

• (extreme greed): avarice, covetousness; see also Thesaurus:greed

Related terms

• cupid

Translations

Anagrams

• pudicity