tenderness

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English

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Alternative forms

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Etymology

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From tender +‎ -ness.

Pronunciation

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Noun

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tenderness (countable and uncountable, plural tendernesses)

  1. A tendency to express warm, compassionate feelings.
    When the lovers were together, their cold indifference gave way to love and tenderness.
    • 1853, Charlotte Brontë, Villette:
      I had known him jealous, suspicious; I had seen about him certain tendernesses, fitfulnesses—a softness which came like a warm air, and a ruth which passed like early dew, dried in the heat of his irritabilities: this was all I had seen.
  2. A concern for the feelings or welfare of others.
    When they saw the poor orphans, they were overwhelmed with tenderness for them.
    Everybody needs a little tenderness sometimes.
  3. (medicine, pathology) A pain or discomfort when an affected area is touched.
    He noted her extreme tenderness when he touched the bruise on her thigh.

Derived terms

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Translations

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