misery

plural miseries

1. countableuncountableGreat unhappiness; extreme pain of body or mind; wretchedness; distress; woe.

   Ever since his wife left him you can see the misery on his face.

   3 more examples

   For miſerie doth braueſt mindes abate, / And make them ſeeke for that they wont to ſcorne, / Of fortune and of hope at once forlorne.

   1578–1579, Edmund Spenser, “Prosopopoia. Or Mother Hubberds Tale. [...] Dedicated to the Right Honorable the Ladie Compton and Mountegle”, in Complaints. Containing Sundrie Small Poemes of the Worlds Vanitie. Whereof the Next Page Maketh Mention, London: Imprinted for VVilliam Ponsonbie, dwelling in Paules Churchyard at the signe of the Bishops head, published 1591, →OCLC

   It was not just the confusion that unhappiness brings, it was not just the loneliness, it was the despair that accompanies all those emotions that turns unhappiness into utter misery.

   2008, Charlotte Bingham, The Land of Summer

   Then, in January, a creeping tsunami of train cancellations, triggered by major staff absences as a result of the aggressive transmissibility of Omicron, heaped further misery on rail users.

   2022 January 12, Nigel Harris, “Comment: Unhappy start to 2022”, in RAIL, number 948, page 3

   Synonyms: dejection, grief, sorrow, blueness, tristesse, mirthlessness, blues, crestfallenness

2. UKUScountabledialectaluncountableA bodily ache or pain.

   [...] and I had a misery in my left breast and shoulder. I was hurt, but knew not how or how much.

   1868, John Vestal Hadley, Seven Months a Prisoner, page 15

   Synonyms: pain, wark

3. countableuncountableCause of misery; calamity; misfortune.

   Synonyms: adversity, woe, affliction, aggrievance, distress, grief, grievance, hardship

4. countableuncountableExtremepoverty.

   The Widdow that hath but a pan of braſſe, […] Muſt pay her Landlord many a groat, Or twil be puld out of her throat: […] The rich haue all, the poore liue in miſerie: […]

   1593, anonymous author, The Life and Death of Iacke Straw […], →OCLC, Act I

   Synonyms: beggary, brokeness, destitution, impecuniosity, impecuniousness, indigence, mendicancy, mendicity

5. archaiccountableuncountablegreed; avarice.

   Synonyms: avarice, covetise, covetousness, cupidity, gluttony, greed, greediness, Mammon

1. derogatoryhumorousslangDerogatory name for Missouri: a state of the United States.

   First, the young lady whom you spoke as becoming [a] mistress of the establishment would most likely (if she could become as such) be brought into a state of misery, instead of being brought from the state of misery, (or Missouri), [...]

   1879 August 20, Noah Allen, “Noah in Misery-He Relieves Himself”, in The Wichita Weekly Beacon, page 3