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sufferance

Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun Patient endurance, especially of pain or distress.
  • noun Suffering; misery.
  • noun Sanction or permission implied or given by failure to prohibit; tacit consent; tolerance.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun The state of suffering; the bearing of pain or other evil; endurance; suffering; misery.
  • noun Damage; loss; injury.
  • noun Submission under difficult or oppressive circumstances; patient endurance; patience.
  • noun Consent by not forbidding or hindering; toleration; allowance; permission; leave.
  • noun In customs, a permission granted for the shipment of certain goods.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun The state of suffering; the bearing of pain; endurance.
  • noun Pain endured; misery; suffering; distress.
  • noun obsolete Loss; damage; injury.
  • noun Submission under difficult or oppressive circumstances; patience; moderation.
  • noun Negative consent by not forbidding or hindering; toleration; permission; allowance; leave.
  • noun engraving A permission granted by the customs authorities for the shipment of goods.
  • noun (Law) the holding by a tenant who came in by a lawful title, but remains, after his right has expired, without positive leave of the owner.
  • noun by mere toleration.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun archaic Endurance, especially patiently, of pain or adversity.
  • noun Acquiescence or tacit compliance with some circumstance, behavior, or instruction.
  • noun archaic Suffering; pain, misery.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun patient endurance especially of pain or distress
  • noun a disposition to tolerate or accept people or situations

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English suffrance, from Old French sufrance, from Latin sufferentia, from sufferēns, sufferent-, present participle of sufferre, to suffer; see suffer.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Anglo-Norman suffraunce, from Late Latin sufferentia.

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Examples

  • Sunday's term was tenancy at sufferance, which is defined as:

    Legal Definitions 2008

  • The leanness that afflicts us, the object of our misery, Is as an inventory to particularise their abundance; Our sufferance is a gain to them.

    ADDRESS OF THE PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC OF SOUTH AFRICA, NELSON MANDELA TO THE JOINT HOUSES OF PARLIAMENT OF THE UNITED KINGDOM 1996

  • If they would yield us but the superfluity, while it were wholesome, we might guess they relieved us humanely; but they think we are too dear: the leanness that afflicts us, the object of our misery, is as an inventory to particularise their abundance; our sufferance is a gain to them.

    Act I. Scene I. Coriolanus 1914

  • The sufferance, which is the badge of the Jew, has made him, in these days, the ruler of the rulers of the earth.

    The Conduct of Life (1860) 1856

  • What authority surfeits on would relieve us: if they would yield us but the superfluity, while it were wholesome, we might guess they relieved us humanely; but they think we are too dear: the leanness that afflicts us, the object of our misery, is as an inventory to particularise their abundance; our sufferance is a gain to them Let us revenge this with our pikes, ere we become rakes: for the gods know I speak this in hunger for bread, not in thirst for revenge.

    The Tragedy of Coriolanus 2004

  • What authority surfeits on would relieve us: if they would yield us but the superfluity, while it were wholesome, we might guess they relieved us humanely; but they think we are too dear: the leanness that afflicts us, the object of our misery, is as an inventory to particularise their abundance; our sufferance is a gain to them Let us revenge this with our pikes, ere we become rakes: for the gods know I speak this in hunger for bread, not in thirst for revenge.

    Coriolanus 1607

  • The inhabitants seem insensible to these impressions, and are apt to imagine the disgust that we avow is little better than affectation; but they ought to have some compassion for strangers, who have not been used to this kind of sufferance; and consider, whether it may not be worth while to take some pains to vindicate themselves from the reproach that, on this account, they bear among their neighbours.

    The Expedition of Humphry Clinker 2004

  • Confederacy, and he would have been supported by earnest and enduring enthusiasm, instead of by that churlish sufferance which is the result of

    Coningsby Benjamin Disraeli 1842

  • 'sufferance' is used in its ordinary modern sense. --/the time's abuse:/the miserable condition of things in the present.

    The New Hudson Shakespeare: Julius Cæsar William Shakespeare 1590

  • The sufferance which is the badge of the Jew has made him in these days the ruler of the rulers of the earth. "

    Four American Leaders Charles William Eliot 1880

Comments

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  • bilby commented on the word sufferance

    "What authority surfeits on would relieve us: if they

    would yield us but the superfluity, while it were

    wholesome, we might guess they relieved us humanely;

    but they think we are too dear: the leanness that

    afflicts us, the object of our misery, is as an

    inventory to particularise their abundance; our

    sufferance is a gain to them Let us revenge this with

    our pikes, ere we become rakes: for the gods know I

    speak this in hunger for bread, not in thirst for revenge."

    - William Shakespeare, 'The Tragedy of Coriolanus'.

    July 26, 2009