weary

tire, weary, fatigue, exhaust, jade mean to make or become unable or unwilling to continue. tire implies a draining of one's strength or patience. the long ride tired us out weary stresses tiring until one is unable to endure more of the same thing. wearied of the constant arguing fatigue suggests great lassitude from excessive strain or undue effort. fatigued by the day's chores exhaust implies complete draining of strength by hard exertion. shoveling snow exhausted him jade suggests the loss of all freshness and eagerness. appetites jaded by overindulgence

Sick and Tired: The Literal and Figurative Meanings of Lassitude

Lassitude and weariness make an interesting pair. As with many nearly synonymous pairs of words in English, one is derived from Latin and the other from Old English. Even though they both mean “the condition of being tired,” they are used in different ways. Following a common pattern, the Latinate word tends to be used in technical, medical, and formal writing, and the Old English-derived word is used when referring to physical, emotional, and spiritual qualities.

Lassitude comes from the Latin word lassus, meaning “weary.” Our English spelling comes from the French word that developed directly from Latin, borrowed in the 15th century. In French, the word las (masculine) or lasse (feminine) means “weary” or “tired,” and the idiom être las de means “to be sick and tired of.” This led to another English word with the same root: alas, a word that expresses sadness or disappointment, but conveys some measure of fatigue and resignation as well.

Though it sometimes is just a fancy word for fatigue in medical contexts, lassitude is also used in ways that are metaphorical and closer in meaning to “negligence”:

Congress was being choked by pettiness and lassitude.
The case was delayed because of sheer lassitude.
The failure was the result of moral lassitude.

Examples of weary in a Sentence

Adjective I would remember the potential for return, all things circling as they do, into something like fullness, small moments of completion that weave together, like Penelope's cloth, doing and undoing themselves by turns, an unfinished pattern that guides a weary traveler home … — Paul Sorrell, Parabola, May 2000 But for the wilted weeds that managed to jut forth in wiry clumps where the mortar was cracked and washed away, the viaduct wall was barren of everything except the affirmation of a weary industrial city's prolonged and triumphant struggle to monumentalize its ugliness. — Philip Roth, American Pastoral, 1997 Every day for a week Ellsworth showed up to see Clarence and every day Miss Eunice and Mr. George Edward would exchange weary glances and shrugs … — Randall Kenan, Let the Dead Bury Their Dead, 1992 I need to rest my weary eyes. The miners were weary after a long shift. She was weary from years of housework. Verb What wearies me about Dickens, however, is his excessive use of words. — Will Manley, Booklist, 1 Nov. 2006 I doubted what Indonesia now had to offer and wearied of being new all over again. — Barack Obama, Dreams from My Father, (1995) 2004 Does it weary me to find some women of the next generation reinventing the wheel when it comes to planning their lives and dreaming of their romantic futures? — Margo Jefferson, New York Times Book Review, 15 Apr. 2001 The work wearies me sometimes. these constant complaints are really wearying me

Recent Examples on the Web: Adjective Local residents told NBC News people there are weary of powerful hurricanes this season. — NBC News, "Hurricane Delta churns toward already-battered Louisiana coast," 9 Oct. 2020 In her south Minneapolis home, Jan Malcolm is weary. — Star Tribune, "Lives, on the line," 2 Oct. 2020 Some businesses owners are weary after months of upheaval. — Sophie Alexander, Bloomberg.com, "In Smoky San Francisco, Covid-Hit Businesses Suffer Double Blow," 11 Sep. 2020 African-Americans are weary of a government whose institutions and policies have either historically ignored or worked against them. — David Paleologos, USA TODAY, "Paleologos on the poll: We're witnessing a citizenry growing distrustful of government, institutions," 5 Sep. 2020 But those allies and partners are weary of working too closely with the United States, the American Enterprise Institute’s China defense expert, Zack Cooper, told the Washington Examiner Thursday. — Abraham Mahshie, Washington Examiner, "Esper casts wide net in Pacific effort to build partners, contain China," 27 Aug. 2020 As infection rates continue to climb in ZIP codes across the country, Wilson is weary of hearing that if Walmart is open, schools should be, too. — USA Today, "'Like saying I don't love her': Parents torn as some schools face greater reopening risks," 11 Aug. 2020 Belarusians have been weary of the country’s deteriorating economy as well as the president’s cavalier dismissal of the coronavirus pandemic. — Fox News, "Police, protesters clash after Belarus presidential vote," 10 Aug. 2020 At a party or a breakfast, Mr. Evans conveyed a world-weary charm, talking in cultured tones of books and newspaper adventures. — Robert D. Mcfadden, New York Times, "Harold Evans Dies at 92; Crusading Newspaperman With a Second Act," 24 Sep. 2020 Recent Examples on the Web: Verb Yet the movie’s rare skirmishes feel authentically battle-wearied and handicapped by conscience. — Jeannette Catsoulis, New York Times, "‘Robert the Bruce’ Review: The Return of the King," 23 Apr. 2020 How would 6% be for a start Several pages of this is charming; forty years’ worth would have been wearying. — Sheila Heti, The New Yorker, "Inside Tove Jansson’s Private Universe," 30 Mar. 2020 Unique pressures If the occasional flight is wearying, imagine the exhaustion of doing it for a living. — Natasha Frost, Quartz, "“A lot of us are suffering”: The dark side of the flight attendant lifestyle," 27 Feb. 2020 Freedom from responsibility, after all, is the fantasy of a world-wearied adult, not of a teenager, who longs for nothing more than to be trusted to make decisions for herself. — Ruth Franklin, The New York Review of Books, "L’Engle’s Cosmic Catechism," 25 Feb. 2020 While an understandable choice, the approach becomes wearying: A few more notes of sincerity would have better served the play. — Celia Wren, Washington Post, "Bravo for reviving the play that scandalized Jane Austen’s world," 11 Nov. 2019 Following that important thread through the next two hours was wearying, particularly once it was subsumed under questions about bathrooms. — Melissa Gira Grant, The New Republic, "Culture War in the Workplace," 13 Jan. 2020 Others face eviction threats from landlords who have wearied of the police showing up. — Anne Deprince, The Conversation, "Don’t make intimate violence victims look for help – research shows they fare better when police and community organizations coordinate assistance," 1 Nov. 2019 Chekhov, whose plays hardly seem to coerce life at all, boldly broke ranks with this wearying regimentation. — The New York Review of Books, "Giles Harvey," 23 May 2019

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