decrepit

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English decrepit,^[2][3] borrowed from Middle French décrépit^[4][3][5] and directly borrowed from Latin dēcrepitus (“very old, infirm”),^[6][7][8][9] formed from dē- (“down”) and crepitus, the past participle of crepō (“to rattle, creak, crack”).^{[5][4][7][10]} The OED records the French word only from the 16th century, with descrepy in the 15th.^[5] Anglo-Norman decrepit is recorded from 1415, as "old and infirm".^[11] The literal sense of the Latin is uncertain:^[12] Ayto takes it as "cracked", with an intensive prefix,^[13] but Skeat and Klein read the second part as the noun of the same spelling, meaning a rattling or noise, and so explain the word as "noiseless", of an old man creeping about.^[14][15] Hoad and Klein call the Latin verb imitative,^[10][15] and Etymonline and Merriam-Webster Unabridged compare it with raven.^[12][3]

Earliest recorded meaning

Feeble with age, of a person: The seyd John is so strykyn into age and decrepyt that he may not come to youre presens, in Chancery proceedings of before 1439.^[2][4] Etymonline dates the word to the mid-15th century,^[12] and the OED's first quotation is from Henryson's Praise of Age, of before 1500.^[5]

Semantic evolution

The Latin word was used of old men and old animals,^[12] and English did the same: a Middle English lapidary speaks of a kock decreppyth.^[2] Weekley quotes an old gloss on the Latin, very olde; at the pittes brinke.^[16] The figurative use for things is recorded from 1594, in Nashe,^[5] and Johnson (1755), who defines the word as worn out with age and in the last stage of decay, quotes Raleigh on this decrepit age of the world.^[17] Modern dictionaries also apply it to things worn out by long use or fallen into disrepair.^[9][3] A noun for a decrepit person, from 1578, is obsolete or local,^[5] and a verb recorded in 1688 did not last.^[5] Decrepitude, from 1603, replaced an earlier noun decrepitus, borrowed from Latin about 1433.^[4]

Timeline

• before 1439 – feeble with age, of a person.^[2][4]
• 1578 – noun, one who is decrepit (obsolete or local).^[5]
• 1594 – figurative, of things.^[5]
• 1688 – verb, to make decrepit (obsolete).^[5]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Weakened by old age; infirm: a decrepit old horse.^[9][3][5]
2. Worn out by long or hard use; in ruin or disrepair, dilapidated: a decrepit barn at the end of the lane.^[9][3]

Word family

• decrepitly
• decrepitness
• decrepitude

Related words

• decrepitate
• crepitate
• crevice
• craven
• raven

Usage notes

The ending has often been assimilated to past participles and adjectives in -id,^[5] and decrepid occurs, for example in Dryden; the Shorter Oxford marks it as obsolete,^[6] though Merriam-Webster Unabridged lists it as a less common variant.^[3]

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
3. ^ a b c d e f g Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
4. ^ a b c d e Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ a b Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ a b Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
9. ^ a b c d Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
10. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
11. ^ Anglo-Norman Dictionary (AND2), Aberystwyth University, anglo-norman.net (2nd ed., 2005–)
12. ^ a b c d Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
13. ^ Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
14. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
15. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
16. ^ Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
17. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.