anile

comparative more anile · superlative most anile

1. Characteristic of a crone or a feeble old woman.

   Romanticism, so sanguine and so venturous in its revolutionary youth, grew anile in its premature decrepitude ; mumbled its credos ; cursed its heretics — and died.

   1880, Robert Alfred Vaughan, Hours with the mystics : a contribution to the history of religious opinion, page 347

   2 more examples

   Dr. Wittman, too, was passing over the same ground trodden by Bonaparte in his Syrian expedition, and had an ample opportunity of inquiring its probable object, and the probably success which (but for the heroic defence of Acre), might have attended it ; he was on the theatre of Bonaparte’s imputed crimes, as well as his notorious defeat ; and might have brought us back, not anile conjecture, but sound evidence of events which must determine his character, who may determine our fate.

   1844, Sydney Smith, The Works of Sydney Smith, “Wittman’s Travels” (Edinburgh Review, 1803), pages 248–249

   Steerpike derived as much pleasure in watching these anile and pitiful creatures, dressed in their purple finery, as they crawled beneath the carpet as he got from anything.

   1950, Mervyn Peake, chapter 8, in Gormenghast, London: Eyre & Spottiswoode

1. archaicuncountableArchaic form of anil (“indigo”).