Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. A process, condition, or period of deterioration or decline, as in morals or art; decay.
- n. A literary movement especially of late 19th-century France and England characterized by refined aestheticism, artifice, and the quest for new sensations.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. A falling off or away; the act or process of falling into an inferior condition or state; the process or state of decay; deterioration.
Wiktionary
- n. A state of moral or artistic decline or deterioration; decay
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. A falling away; decay; deterioration; declension. “The old castle, where the family lived in their
decadence .”
WordNet 3.0
- n. the state of being degenerate in mental or moral qualities
Etymologies
- From French décadence, from Medieval Latin decadentia ("decay"), from *decadens ("decaying"), present participle of *decadere ("to decay"); see decay. (Wiktionary)
- French décadence, from Old French decadence, from Medieval Latin dēcadentia, a decaying, declining, from Vulgar Latin *dēcadere, to decay; see decay. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“Although I am loathe to use the word, the term decadence comes to mind.”
“On the other, Ramadan TV talk shows on state-sponsored television featuring racily dressed female hosts discussing intimate sex secrets with celebrities have sparked outrage from conservatives, denouncing what they call the decadence that is sweeping the nation.”
“In a post-Apocalyptic world where supernaturals have emerged from hiding, wealthy humans delight in decadence while the religious gain power through temptation.”
“Take heart, things are gonna be rough, in many ways over the next decade, the soft and spoiled days of cheap energy are over, decadence is about to implode.”
“Whitefish Imperial is a slightly less decadent and much less expensive version of crab imperial, a dish that is the definition of decadence.”
“Lately the topic of decadence is weighing heavily on my thoughts.”
“The current attitude of get-alongism that plagues the Church, evidence of a profound decadence, is not a good sign for the future.”
“Pobrecito's ill-fated hope of leading a life of decadence is derived from looking at porn magazines, secreted away in an American cemetery, which he takes to selling on the streets in exchange for food.”
REVIEW: The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of the Year Volume 1 edited by Jonathan Strahan
“This zone was developed at the beginning of the 8th century A.D., when the lowland cities of the Maya were in decadence or already abandoned.”
“Dining for a month on the traditional, super-rich winter cuisine of northern Italy has been a delightful exercise in decadence, but I might not make it to spring unless I get some roughage to cut through this buildup of breadsticks, butter, whipped cream, chocolate, meat, egg-yolk pasta and cheese.”
USATODAY.com - Looking back on the culinary delights of Torino
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘decadence’.
-
Test Prep or Just for fun
Building a list for standardized test prep or just for learning some new words! Please add any words that you feel are important for the SAT/GRE/GMAT etc...
throng, morass, parley, facile, kismet, strife, jetsam, carrion, annex, harbinger, vestige, surreptitious and 575 more...
-
1100
abound, technology, branch of knowled..., prognosticate, automaton, matron, an older married ..., realm, special field of ..., kingdom, annals, historical records and 981 more...
-
GRE Barrons Wordlist
A complete Barron's Wordlist for GRE preparation. Your online flashcard replacement.
abase, abash, abate, abbreviate, abdicate, aberrant, aberration, abet, abeyance, abhor, abject, abjure and 4087 more...
-
Things that Can (and Should) be set O...
The words piano and sister may not appear on this list. It all started on flaming piano.
bottled water, dudley moore, wads of unpaid bills, casu marzu factories, pogroms, frozen pizzas, breakable glass f..., cacophonists, intransigents, belligerent smurfs, police academy re..., unidentified samp... and 103 more...
-
GRE 2014
abate, abdicate, abase, aberrant, abeyance, abhor, abjure, abortive, abound, abrasive, abreast, abridge and 1577 more...
-
Snooty
Words that think way too much of themselves
notoriety, posh, victorian, mien, terrace, veritable, ambivalent, paradox, hypocrisy, damned, caprice, renaissance and 8 more...
-
Favorites
disparage, partisan, cupidity, hokum, tussle, odious, dastardly, overture, plane, chronic, peering, peer and 328 more...
-
Neww
specious, disdainfully, vehemently, in lieu of, dismissive, perpetual, preposterous, impasse, fathom, conversely, repugnant, clogged and 142 more...
-
apjoseph's words
insurmountable, ubiquitous, unequivocal, incumbent, asinine, amenable, sycophants, precarious, malevolent, gregarious, raison detra, nefarious and 200 more...
-
Twitter favourites
The new favourite words of people on Twitter.
A script searches Twitter for "X is my new favourite word" and adds it to this list.
See also:
bumwank, calamity, recalcitrant, gayenese, jeeze, nonsense, flabbergasted, juxtapose, procrastinating, ossanity, biffing, loser and 1972 more... -
Out of Book Words
commiserate, equanimity, dulcet, cursory, diffident, profligate, egregious, precocious, dissemble, aggregate, efficacy, ingenuous and 100 more...
-
The Sog Collection
My big word list.
chaos, flaccid, empirical, flotsam, cacophony, grumble, assuage, awe, romance, mortality, coalesce, fortuitous and 3282 more...
-
cxfx's list
callipygous, scaphism, ubermorgen, handschuhschneeba..., farctate, autohagiography, autolatry, spindrift, feculent, verisimilitude, brobdingnagian, ineluctable and 205 more...
-
colleen's words
yellow, green, pie, blue, fur, people, incense, book, brown, avuncular, mountain, fog and 1316 more...
-
words i love
fuss, rhythm, obfuscate, sumptuous, decadence, ethereal, peach, stingy, muscle, wrapper, corpus, dastardly deed and 90 more...
-
GRE
anomaly, assuage, enigma, equivocal, erudite, fervid, placate, lucid, opaque, precipitate, prodigal, zeal and 113 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for decadence.
Comments
No comments yet...
Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.