desuetude

noun de·sue·tude \ ˈde-swi-ˌtüd , -ˌtyüd , di-ˈsü-ə- , -ˈsyü- \

Definition of desuetude

: discontinuance from use or exercise : disuse

desuetude was our Word of the Day on 12/16/2007. Hear the podcast!

Examples of desuetude in a Sentence

despite the long years of desuetude, the old manual typewriter seemed to work just fine

Recent Examples of desuetude from the Web

This Customs guidance has gone entirely unenforced for decades, but it was reissued — perhaps to keep it from desuetude — by the Obama administration in its final years.

— eugene kontorovich, Washington Post, "Canada corrects its ‘Made in Israel’ policy. Now it is time for the U.S. to do the same.," 17 July 2017
Glenn Close returns to the role of Norma Desmond in the 1993 Andrew Lloyd Webber musical, based on Billy Wilder’s classic portrait of Hollywood desuetude.

— The New Yorker, "Sunset Boulevard," 9 Feb. 2017

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'desuetude.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

Did You Know?

Desuetude must be closely related to "disuse," right? Wrong. Despite the similarities between them, "desuetude" and "disuse" derive from two different Latin verbs. Desuetude comes from "suescere," a word that means "to accustom" (it also gave us the word custom). "Disuse" descends from "uti," which means "to use" (that Latin word also gave us "use" and "utility"). Of the two, "disuse" is now the more common. "Desuetude" hasn't fallen into desuetude yet, and it was put to good use in the past, as in the 17th-century writings of Scottish Quaker Robert Barclay, who wrote, "The weighty Truths of God were neglected, and, as it were, went into Desuetude."

Origin and Etymology of desuetude

Middle English dissuetude, from Latin desuetudo, from desuescere to become unaccustomed, from de- + suescere to become accustomed; akin to Latin sodalis comrade — more at sib

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First Known Use: 15th century

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