Wrecchednesse

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. An archaic term for a state of profound misery, suffering, or distress ; a condition of moral baseness, vileness, or sinful wickedness
2. Old English-style spelling meaning utter misery or affliction ; the quality of being morally base, vile, or sinful
3. Deep unhappiness and hardship in an older usage ; the moral corruption or vileness of a person or deed

Etymology: "Wrecchednesse" is a Middle English noun, the ancestor of modern "wretchedness," built from "wrecche" (wretch) plus the suffix "-nesse," which turned an adjective into an abstract noun of state, as in "goodnesse" or "kindnesse." The root word "wrecche" came from Old English "wrecca," meaning an exile or a person driven out, a sense that carried a strong idea of hardship and banishment before it took on the moral and emotional flavour of misery we now associate with it. The spelling with a doubled "c" and a final "e" reflects the Middle English period, when scribes wrote the word in many variant forms. Forms like this one appear in Middle English texts, and the word was used in the sense of a miserable condition or distress. Its later spelling settled into "wretchedness" as English spelling standardised.