impuissance
English
[edit]Etymology
[edit]Borrowed from Middle French impuissance.
Noun
[edit]impuissance (usually uncountable, plural impuissances)
- Impotence, weakness.
- 1603, Michel de Montaigne, chapter 8, in John Florio, transl., The Essayes […], book II, London: […] Val[entine] Simmes for Edward Blount […], →OCLC:
- This fault, for a man not to be able to know himselfe betimes, and not to feele the impuissance and extreme alteration, that age doth naturally bring, […] hath lost the reputation of the most part of the greatest men in the world.
- 1603, Plutarch, “Of the Fortune or Vertue of King Alexander. The Second Oration.”, in Philemon Holland, transl., The Philosophie, Commonlie Called, The Morals […], London: […] Arnold Hatfield, →OCLC, page 1275:
- [A]ll which things, bring perill to thoſe that know not how to uſe them well; and neither honour and credit, nor puiſſance, but rather argue their feebleneſse and impuiſſance.
French
[edit]Etymology
[edit]From in- + puissance (or possibly from impuissant + -ance).
Pronunciation
[edit]Noun
[edit]impuissance f (plural impuissances)
Further reading
[edit]- “impuissance”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012
Categories:
- English terms borrowed from Middle French
- English terms derived from Middle French
- English lemmas
- English nouns
- English uncountable nouns
- English countable nouns
- English terms with quotations
- French terms prefixed with in-
- French terms suffixed with -ance
- French 3-syllable words
- French terms with IPA pronunciation
- Rhymes:French/ɑ̃s
- Rhymes:French/ɑ̃s/3 syllables
- French lemmas
- French nouns
- French countable nouns
- French feminine nouns