DESUETUDE Synonyms: 11 Similar and Opposite Words

desuetude

noun

ˈde-swi-ˌtüd

Definition of desuetude

as in neglect

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

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Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

Recent Examples of desuetude Instead of working alone, Mahama shares his process through these organizations, offering Ghana’s people the chance to rebuild after a period of desuetude. — Edna Bonhomme, Artforum, 1 Oct. 2025 New England travel writer and physician Jonathan Brown visited Sans-Souci in the 1830s, long after the king’s suicide in 1820, when the palace had been completely pillaged and had fallen into utter desuetude. — Marlene Daut, Harper's BAZAAR, 8 Oct. 2021 Some passengers, however, seem to have moved beyond our technological limitations to a conceptual world where human drivers have fallen into desuetude. — Peter Jakubowicz, Wired, 4 Sep. 2021 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, 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, 9 Feb. 2017

Recent Examples of Synonyms for desuetude

Noun

Both Walter and Lefever have pleaded not guilty to three counts of chronic neglect of a child causing great bodily harm and two counts of chronic neglect of a child causing emotional damage, his online records show.

— Samira Asma-Sadeque, PEOPLE, 26 Aug. 2026
Iron Jane follows Janie John (González), who after a childhood shaped by neglect and invisibility, is pulled into a world that finally sees her, where pain is power and bodies are built, not born.

— Matt Grobar, Deadline, 25 Aug. 2026

Definition of neglect

Noun

Built into a natural ravine, the stadium’s site was used for ancient Greek athletic contests and later Roman spectacles before falling into centuries of disuse.

— ABC News, ABC News, 16 Aug. 2026
So long as effective communication persists, the reflex to mourn the disuse of a language can be motivated only by something else—nostalgia or, perhaps, the loss of a group’s ability to easily demarcate itself.

— The New Yorker, New Yorker, 10 Aug. 2026

Definition of disuse

Noun

The note appears twice in handwriting and is typed again on the final report of well abandonment.

— Clara Harter, Los Angeles Times, 30 Aug. 2026
For Smotkin, the water crisis reflects the island’s history of structural neglect and systemic abandonment by both local and federal authorities.

— Isabel Rosales, CNN Money, 28 Aug. 2026

Definition of abandonment

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destructive

desuetude

desuetudes

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“Desuetude.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/desuetude. Accessed 2 Sep. 2026.

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Synonyms of desuetude

noun

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