different between feeble vs wearish

English

Etymology

From Middle English feble, from Anglo-Norman feble (“weak, feeble”) (compare French faible), from Latin fl?bilis (“tearful, mournful, lamentable”). Doublet of foible.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?fi?b?l/
• Rhymes: -i?b?l

Adjective

feeble (comparative feebler, superlative feeblest)

1. Deficient in physical strength

   Though she appeared old and feeble, she could still throw a ball.
2. Lacking force, vigor, or efficiency in action or expression; faint.

   That was a feeble excuse for an example.

Synonyms

• (physically weak): weak, infirm, debilitated
• (wanting force, vigor or efficiency): faint

Derived terms

Translations

Verb

feeble (third-person singular simple present feebles, present participle feebling, simple past and past participle feebled)

1. (obsolete) To make feeble; to enfeeble.

References

• feeble in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• feeble in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.

Anagrams

• beflee

Middle English

Adjective

feeble

1. Alternative form of feble

English

Etymology

Possibly from weary + -ish.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /?w?????/

Adjective

wearish (comparative more wearish, superlative most wearish)

1. (obsolete) Tasteless, having a sickly flavour; insipid.
2. (obsolete or dialectal) Sickly, wizened, feeble.
   • 1596, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, IV.5:

     Who was to weet a wretched wearish elfe, / With hollow eyes and rawbone cheekes forspent […].

   • , New York Review Books, 2001, p.16:

     Democritus, as he is described by Hippocrates and Laertius, was a little wearish old man, very melancholy by nature, averse from company in his latter days, and much given to solitariness […].

Derived terms

• wearishness

Anagrams

• washier