Amaritude

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. The quality of being bitter, whether in flavor or in the harshness of a person's emotions and attitudes
2. A sharp, unpleasant bitterness that can describe either a taste on the tongue or a resentful state of mind
3. Bitter harshness, a sour or acrid quality found in tastes, speech, or the feelings a person holds toward others

Etymology: "Amaritude" is the state of being bitter, and it came into English in the Middle Ages from Old French, which had taken it from Latin. The Latin "amāritūdō" was built on "amārus," meaning "bitter," with the suffix "-tūdō," which turns an adjective into a noun for a quality or condition, much as English "fortitude" or "longitude" do. The result is a plain, literal name for bitterness as a condition. Because the word is a straightforward formation on an adjective, its history is short: one Latin root, one suffix, and a path through French into Middle English. Its meaning has stayed close to the original sense of bitterness itself, with no major shift from concrete to abstract along the way.

Synonyms: bitterness, acerbity, acrimony

Antonyms: sweetness