Hello, you have come here looking for the meaning of the word
harshness. In DICTIOUS you will not only get to know all the dictionary meanings for the word
harshness, but we will also tell you about its etymology, its characteristics and you will know how to say
harshness in singular and plural. Everything you need to know about the word
harshness you have here. The definition of the word
harshness will help you to be more precise and correct when speaking or writing your texts. Knowing the definition of
harshness, as well as those of other words, enriches your vocabulary and provides you with more and better linguistic resources.
English
Etymology
From Middle English harsknes; equivalent to harsh + -ness.
Noun
harshness (countable and uncountable, plural harshnesses)
- The quality of being harsh.
1891, Thomas Hardy, Tess of the d'Urbervilles, part 6:And yet these harshnesses are tenderness itself when compared with the universal harshness out of which they grow; the harshness of the position towards the temperament, of the means towards the aims, of to-day towards yesterday, of hereafter towards to-day.
1914 November, Louis Joseph Vance, “An Outsider ”, in Munsey’s Magazine, volume LIII, number II, New York, N.Y.: The Frank A Munsey Company, , published 1915, →OCLC, chapter II (Burglary), page 378, column 1:She wakened in sharp panic, bewildered by the grotesquerie of some half-remembered dream in contrast with the harshness of inclement fact, drowsily realizing that since she had fallen asleep it had come on to rain smartly out of a shrouded sky.
Translations