Adjacent Words

Impotent definitions

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Webster's 1828 Dictionary

IM'POTENT, a. [L. impotens.]
1. Weak; feeble; wanting strength or power; unable by nature, or disabled by disease or accident to perform any act.
I know thou wast not slow to hear,
Nor impotent to save.
2. Wanting the power of propagation, as males.
3. Wanting the power of restraint; not having the command over; as impotent of tongue.
IM'POTENT, n. One who is feeble, infirm, or languishing under disease.

WordNet (r) 3.0 (2005)

adj
1: lacking power or ability; "Technology without morality is barbarous; morality without technology is impotent"- Freeman J.Dyson; "felt impotent rage" [ant: potent, stiff, strong]
2: (of a male) unable to copulate [ant: potent, virile]

Merriam Webster's

adjective Etymology: Middle English, from Anglo-French & Latin; Anglo-French, from Latin impotent-, impotens, from in- + potent-, potens potent Date: 14th century 1. a. not potent ; lacking in power, strength, or vigor ; helpless b. unable to engage in sexual intercourse because of inability to have and maintain an erection; broadly sterile 2. obsolete incapable of self-restraint ; ungovernable • impotent noun • impotently adverb

Oxford Reference Dictionary

adj. 1 a powerless; lacking all strength. b helpless, decrepit. 2 (esp. of a male) unable, esp. for a prolonged period, to achieve a sexual erection or orgasm. Derivatives: impotence n. impotency n. impotently adv. Etymology: ME f. OF f. L impotens (as IN-(1), POTENT(1))

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Impotent Im"po*tent, n. One who is imoitent. [R.] --Shak.

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Impotent Im"po*tent, a. [F. impotent, L. impotens, -entis; pref. im- not + potens potent, powerful. See Potent.] 1. Not potent; wanting power, strength. or vigor. whether physical, intellectual, or moral; deficient in capacity; destitute of force; weak; feeble; infirm. There sat a certain man at Lystra, impotent inhis feet. --Acts xiv. 8. O most lame and impotent conclusion! --Shak. Not slow to hear, Nor impotent to save. --Addison. 2. Wanting the power of self-restraint; incontrolled; ungovernable; violent. Impotent of tongue, her silence broke. --Dryden. 3. (Med.) Wanting the power of procreation; unable to copulate; also, sometimes, sterile; barren.

Collin's Cobuild Dictionary

1. If someone feels impotent, they feel that they have no power to influence people or events. The aggression of a bully leaves people feeling hurt, angry and impotent... = powerless ADJ 2. If a man is impotent, he is unable to have sex normally, because his penis fails to get hard or stay hard. ADJ: usu v-link ADJ

International Standard Bible Encyclopedia

im'-po-tent (astheneo, adunatos): The verb signifies "to be without strength," and derivatives of it are used in Joh 5:3,7 the King James Version and Ac 4:9 to characterize the paralyzed man at Bethesda and the cripple at the Temple gate. For the same condition of the Lystra lame man the word adunatos is used, which is synonymous. In these cases it is the weakness of disease. In this sense the word is used by Shakespeare (Love's Labor Lost, V, ii, 864; Hamlet, I, ii, 29). The impotent folk referred to in the Epistle of Jeremy (Baruch 6:28) were those weak and feeble from age and want; compare "impotent and snail-paced beggary" (Richard III, IV, iii, 53).

Alexander Macalister

Soule's Dictionary of English Synonyms

a. 1. Powerless, unable, incapable, incompetent, disabled, incapacitated, imbecile, weak, feeble, infirm, frail, inefficient. 2. Unable to procreate, incapable of begetting offspring.

Moby Thesaurus

acarpous, aimless, anemic, arid, asexual, asthenic, barren, blank cartridge, bloodless, careless, castrated, castrato, celibate, chicken, childless, cold, cowardly, crippled, debilitated, desert, desolate, disabled, drained, dried-up, drooping, droopy, dry, dud, dull, easy, easygoing, effete, emasculate, emasculated, enervated, enfeebled, etiolated, eunuch, eunuchized, exhausted, faint, faintish, fallow, featherweight, feckless, feeble, flabby, flaccid, floppy, forceless, frail, frigid, fruitless, frustrated, gaunt, gelded, gelding, gone, gutless, helpless, imbecile, imprecise, inadequate, incompetent, indifferent, ineffective, ineffectual, inefficacious, inept, infecund, infertile, infirm, invalid, invertebrate, issueless, jejune, languid, languorous, lax, leached, lenient, lightweight, limber, limp, listless, loose, lustless, marrowless, meaningless, menopausal, negligent, nerveless, neuter, neutral, no go, no-account, nonfertile, nonproducing, nonproductive, nonprolific, of no account, of no use, overindulgent, overpermissive, permissive, pithless, pointless, pooped, powerless, purposeless, relaxed, remiss, rubbery, sapless, sexless, sine prole, sinewless, slack, slipshod, sloppy, soft, spineless, sterile, strengthless, sucked dry, superfluous, teemless, unauthoritative, unavailing, uncultivated, unfertile, unfruitful, unhardened, unnerved, unplowed, unproductive, unprolific, unrestrained, unsexed, unsexual, unsown, unstrung, untilled, useless, virgin, waste, wasted, weak, weakling, weakly, without any weight, without issue