sickliness
nounEtymology From sickly + -ness.
1
Usually The state or characteristic of weakness, incapacity, or physical distress due to poor health, especially of a chronic nature.
- I do beseech your majesty, impute his words To wayward sickliness and age in him.1595 December 9 (first known performance), William Shakespeare, “The Life and Death of King Richard the Second”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act 2, scene 1]:
- Gradually it gave place to a smile; a feeble, helpless, melancholy smile; bland, almost to sickliness.1842 December – 1844 July, Charles Dickens, chapter 9, in The Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit, London: Chapman and Hall, […], published 1844, →OCLC:
1 more example
- My devotions were disturbed with a feeling of languor and sickliness, and the tormenting fear of its becoming worse: and a depressing headache was generally my companion throughout the day.1847 December, Acton Bell [pseudonym; Anne Brontë], chapter 7, in Agnes Grey. […], London: Thomas Cautley Newby, […], →OCLC:
- Synonyms
- unwellness