imbecility

English

Etymology

From Middle English inbecillite, from Middle French imbecilité, imbecillité, and its etymon Classical Latin imbēcillitās. By surface analysis, imbecile +‎ -ity.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˌɪmbəˈsɪləti/

• Audio (Southern England):

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Noun

imbecility (countable and uncountable, plural imbecilities)

1. (uncountable) The quality of being imbecile; weakness; feebleness, especially of mind.
   • 1938, Norman Lindsay, Age of Consent, 1st Australian edition, Sydney, N.S.W.: Ure Smith, published 1962, →OCLC, page 89:

     The police prosecutor hammered at him and the bench had a go at him, and they commanded from him such a madhouse particularity between the distinctions of looking and seeing that Bradly was reduced to imbecility, and so contradictious were his mutterings that he was openly suspected of trying to shield that wretched tramp, whom Bradly would have gladly seen sunk in the bottomless pit reserved for snoopers.

   • 2025 December 20, Richard Fausset, Ken Bensinger, quoting Ben Shapiro, “Turning Point’s Annual Gathering Turns Into a Gripefest”, in The New York Times‎^[1], New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company, →ISSN, →OCLC:

     He [Ben Shapiro] wielded a particularly pointed arrow at Tucker Carlson, the former Fox News host, for engaging in what he said was “an act of moral imbecility,” by recently airing a softball interview with Nick Fuentes, an avowed antisemite.

     (Can we archive this URL?)

2. Something imbecilic; a stupid action, behaviour, etc.
   • 1895, Degeneration, New York: D. Appleton and Company, translation of Entartung by Max Simon Nordau, page 270:

     The Parnassian theory of art is mere imbecility.

   • 1950, Norman Lindsay, Dust or Polish?, Sydney: Angus and Robertson, page 37:

     The procedure of musical comedy is not reducible to a coherent formula, so that its imbecilities may be annotated by super imbecilities.

Derived terms

• imbecilitate

Translations

quality of imbecile, stupid behaviour

• Bulgarian: слабоумие (bg) n (slaboumie), малоумие (bg) n (maloumie)
• Catalan: imbecil·litat (ca) f
• French: imbécilité (fr) f
• Greek: ηλιθιότητα (el) f (ilithiótita), βλακεία (el) f (vlakeía)
• Italian: imbecillità (it) f
• Latin: imbecillitas
• Manx: meecheeall f, meecheeallid m, ommidjys m, anlheil m, anlheiltys m, jei-hushtaght f
• Occitan: imbecillitat f
• Russian: слабоу́мие (ru) n (slaboúmije), дебили́зм (ru) m (debilízm), имбеци́льность (ru) f (imbecílʹnostʹ)
• Spanish: imbecilidad (es) f
• Turkish: ahmaklık (tr), alıklık (tr), aptallık (tr), behalet, eblehlik (tr)

  Ottoman Turkish: شاشقینلق (şaşkınlık)