sagacity

plural sagacities

1. uncountableusuallyThe quality of being sage, wise, or able to make good decisions; the quality of being perceptive, astute or insightful.First known use 16th c.

   See Thesaurus:wisdom

   2 more examples

   Young ladies have great penetration in such matters as these; but I think I may defy even your sagacity, to discover the name of your admirer.

   1813 January 27, [Jane Austen], chapter 15, in Pride and Prejudice: […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), London: […] [George Sidney] for T[homas] Egerton, […], →OCLC

   Immediately after the meal, when he was alone again, he set to work to examine Drayton’s papers, of which there lay quite a mass on the table near him and, leaning toward the lamp on his elbow, he weighed the meaning of each with a certain sideward sagacity of gaze, a sagacity that smiled in its self-sureness. Swiss Family Robinson- "....near the mouth of a creek, towards which all our geese and ducks betook themselves; and I, relying on their sagacity, followed in the same course."

   1904, M. P. Shiel, The Evil That Men Do, London: Ward, Lock & Co., Chapter

   Synonyms: sagaciousness, wisdom

2. obsoleteuncountableusuallyKeen sense of smell.

   […] this Beast [the Ichneumon] is not only enemy to the Crocodile and Asp, but also to their Egs, which she hunteth out by the sagacity of her nose, and so destroyeth them […]

   1607, Edward Topsell, The History of Four-footed Beasts, Serpents, and Insects, London: G. Sawbridge et al., published 1658, page 352