indolent

Etymology

It is borrowed from Late Latin indolēns (“insensitive to pain, painless”),^[2][3][4][5] formed from in- (“not”) and dolēns (“grieving”), the present participle of doleō (“to feel pain, grieve”),^[2][3][6][4] the verb behind doleful and dolour.^[7][8] Barnhart says the Latin word was coined by Jerome to render Ancient Greek ἀπηλγήκοτες (apēlgḗkotes) in Ephesians.^[3][2] Barnhart and Ayto trace the modern sense "lazy" to French indolent,^[3][7] which the OED dates to the 16th and 17th centuries,^[2] and Barnhart traces it to indolent (“insensitive, callous”).^[3] Etymonline leaves open French or Late Latin for the medical sense too.^[8]

Earliest recorded meaning

Of a condition, causing no pain, a medical term: 1663, in Boyle.^[2][3][5] Etymonline has the 1660s, Dictionary.com 1655–65.^[8][9]

Semantic evolution

The word began as a technical term of medicine, used especially of an ulcer or tumour that gives the patient no pain.^[10][7] In French it had meanwhile broadened through "insensitive" to "inactive, lazy", and that is the source of the English use,^[7][3] first recorded in 1710 in Steele's Tatler,^[2][3][8] followed by Addison's Spectator in 1711.^[3] Indolence went the same way, from insensitivity to pain (1603) through a state of rest without pain or pleasure (1656) to laziness (1710).^[2][8] Etymonline suggests that this last sense reflects the idea of avoiding trouble, comparing taking pains for working hard,^[8] and Weekley makes the same comparison.^[11] Johnson (1755) gave "free from pain" first and "careless; lazy; inattentive; listless" second, and in 1773 added that surgeons speak of an indolent tumour.^[12] In medical use the sense has widened from painless to slow to heal or slow to progress.^[2][5][13]

Timeline

• 1663 – medicine: causing no pain.^[2][3][5]
• 1710 – of people and their dispositions, lazy, averse to effort.^[2][3][8]
• 1720 – noun, a lazy person (the OED's last record is 1810).^[2]
• 1739 – of a pain, very slight (obsolete).^[2]

Meanings

Adjective

1. (medicine) Causing little or no pain: an indolent cyst.^[5][13][2]
2. (medicine) Growing or progressing slowly; slow to heal: an indolent sore on the shin.^[5][13][2]
3. Disliking work or effort; lazy or slothful: an indolent clerk who left every task for Friday.^[5][13][2]
4. Encouraging laziness or showing it: the indolent warmth of the late morning.^[5]

Noun

1. A lazy person.^[5] The OED treats this noun as obsolete, with records from 1720 to 1810.^[2]

Word family

• indolently

Related words

• indolence
• doleful
• dolor
• dolent

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
4. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
6. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
7. ^ a b c d Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
8. ^ a b c d e f g Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
9. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
10. ^ Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
11. ^ Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
12. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
13. ^ a b c d Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins