different between pity vs plight

English

Alternative forms

• pittie, pitty, pitie (obsolete)

Etymology

From Middle English pitye, pitie, pittye, pitee, pite, from Anglo-Norman pité, pittee etc., from Old French pitet, pitié, from Latin piet?s. See also the doublets pietà and piety.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?p?ti/
• Rhymes: -?ti

Noun

pity (countable and uncountable, plural pities)

1. (uncountable) A feeling of sympathy at the misfortune or suffering of someone or something.

   • He that hath pity upon the poor lendeth unto the Lord.

   • , Folio Society, 2006, p.5:

     The most usuall way to appease those minds we have offended […] is, by submission to move them to commiseration and pitty.

2. (countable) Something regrettable.

   • It was a thousand pities.

   • What pity is it / That we can die but once to serve our country!

3. (obsolete) Piety.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Wyclif to this entry?)

Synonyms

• (mercy): ruth
• (something regrettable): shame

Translations

Verb

pity (third-person singular simple present pities, present participle pitying, simple past and past participle pitied)

1. (transitive) To feel pity for (someone or something). [from 15th c.]

   • Like as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear him.

2. (transitive, now regional) To make (someone) feel pity; to provoke the sympathy or compassion of. [from 16th c.]
   • 1596, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, IV.11:

     She lenger yet is like captiv'd to bee; / That even to thinke thereof it inly pitties mee.

   • a. 1681, Richard Allestree, Of Gods Method in giving Deliverance

     It pitieth them to see her in the dust.

Translations

Interjection

pity!

1. Short form of what a pity.

Synonyms

• shame, what a pity, what a shame

Translations

Derived terms

Czech

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): [?p?t?]

Verb

pity

1. inflection of pít:
   1. inanimate masculine plural passive participle
   2. feminine plural passive participle

Lower Sorbian

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?p?it?/

Participle

pity

1. past passive participle of pi?

Declension

Polish

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?p?i.t?/

Participle

pity

1. masculine singular passive adjectival participle of pi?

Declension

Noun

pity f

1. inflection of pita:
   1. genitive singular
   2. nominative/accusative/vocative plural

English

Pronunciation

• enPR: pl?t, IPA^(key): /pla?t/
• Rhymes: -a?t

Etymology 1

From Middle English plit (“fold, wrinkle, bad situation”), conflation of Middle English pliht, plight (“risky promise, peril”) (from Old English pliht "danger, risk") and Anglo-Norman plit, plyte (“fold, condition”), from Old French pleit (“condition, manner of folding”) (from Vulgar Latin *plictum, from Latin plicitum (“fold”)).

Noun

plight (plural plights)

1. A dire or unfortunate situation. [from 14th c.]
   • 2005, Lesley Brown, translating Plato, Sophist, 243c:

     Though we say we are quite clear about it and understand when someone uses the expression, unlike that other expression, maybe we're in the same plight with regard to them both.
2. (now rare) A (neutral) condition or state. [from 14th c.]
3. (obsolete) Good health. [14th–19th c.]
   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, III.7:

     All wayes shee sought him to restore to plight, / With herbs, with charms, with counsel, and with teares […].

Translations

Etymology 2

From Middle English plight (“risk, danger”), from Old English pliht (“peril, risk, danger, damage, plight”), from Proto-West Germanic *plihti (“care, responsibility, duty”). A suffixed form of the root represented by Old English pleoh (“risk, danger, hurt, peril"; also "responsibility”) and pl?on (“to endanger, risk”). Akin to Old English plihtan (“to endanger, compromise”). Cognate with Scots plicht (“responsibility, plight”), Dutch plicht, Low German plicht (“duty”), German Pflicht (“duty”), Danish pligt (“duty”), Yiddish ??????? (flikht). More at pledge.

Noun

plight (plural plights)

1. (now chiefly dialectal) Responsibility for ensuing consequences; risk; danger; peril.
2. (now chiefly dialectal) An instance of danger or peril; a dangerous moment or situation.
3. (now chiefly dialectal) Blame; culpability; fault; wrong-doing; sin; crime.
4. (now chiefly dialectal) One's office; duty; charge.
5. (archaic) That which is exposed to risk; that which is plighted or pledged; security; a gage; a pledge.

Derived terms

• plightful
• plightly

Translations

Verb

plight (third-person singular simple present plights, present participle plighting, simple past and past participle plighted)

1. (transitive, now rare) To expose to risk; to pledge.
2. (transitive) Specifically, to pledge (one's troth etc.) as part of a marriage ceremony.
3. (reflexive) To promise (oneself) to someone, or to do something.
   • 1992, Hilary Mantel, A Place of Greater Safety, Harper Perennial 2007, p. 226:

     I ask what I have done to deserve it, one daughter hobnobbing with radicals and the other planning to plight herself to a criminal.

Derived terms

• plighter

Etymology 3

From Middle English plyghten, ply?ten, pley?ten, pleiten, pliten, from the noun (see below).

Verb

plight (third-person singular simple present plights, present participle plighting, simple past and past participle plighted)

1. (obsolete) To weave; to braid; to fold; to plait.

Etymology 4

From Middle English pli?t, plight, plyt, pleit, from Anglo-Norman pleit (“pleat, fold”). More at plait.

Noun

plight (plural plights)

2. (obsolete) A network; a plait; a fold; rarely a garment.

Further reading

• Plight in the Encyclopædia Britannica (11th edition, 1911)