drunkenness

noun

Etymology: Etymology tree English drunken Proto-Germanic *-in- Proto-Indo-European *-h₂ Proto-Indo-European *-éh₂ Proto-Indo-European *-yéti Proto-Indo-European *-eh₂yéti Proto-Indo-European *-h₂ti Proto-Germanic *-ōną Proto-Germanic *-inōną Proto-Indo-European *-dyé- Proto-Germanic *-atjaną Proto-Indo-European *-tus Proto-Germanic *-þuz Proto-Germanic *-assuz Proto-Germanic *-inassuz Proto-West Germanic *-nassī Old English -nes Middle English -nesse English -ness English drunkenness From drunken + -ness.

1. A state of being drunk.

   “But presently the fumes of the wine rising to his head, he became helplessly drunk and his side-muscles and limbs relaxed and he swayed to and fro on my back. When I saw that he had lost his senses for drunkenness, I put my head to his legs and, loosing them from my neck, stooped down well-nigh to the ground and threw him at full length, […]”

   “The Englishman had a reputation throughout Europe for gluttony; it was said that overeating was the English vice, just as lust was the French vice and drunkenness the German vice. Some Englishmen became very fat, and were famous for being so. Henry VIII ate enormous meals, but as a young man he was slim, perhaps because he always took a great deal of physical exercise. By the time that he was forty-five he was suffering from painful ulcers in his leg which prevented him from riding or walking without the greatest difficulty; but though he ceased to take exercise, he ate as much as ever. He then became very fat.”