fragility
English
[edit]Etymology
[edit]Borrowed from Middle French fragilité, from Latin fragilitās. Doublet of frailty.
Morphologically fragile + -ity
Pronunciation
[edit]Noun
[edit]fragility (countable and uncountable, plural fragilities)
- The condition or quality of being fragile; brittleness; frangibility.
- 2013 June 7, David Simpson, “Fantasy of navigation”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 188, number 26, page 36:
- It is tempting to speculate about the incentives or compulsions that might explain why anyone would take to the skies in [the] basket [of a balloon]: […]; perhaps to moralise on the oneness or fragility of the planet, or to see humanity for the small and circumscribed thing that it is; […].
- Weakness; feebleness.
- (obsolete) Liability to error and sin; frailty.
Derived terms
[edit]Translations
[edit]condition or quality of being fragile
|
weakness
References
[edit]- “fragility”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
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