Word.ws English Dictionary

languishes

languishes is the third-person singular simple present indicative of languish.

Meaning of languish

Verb

languish (third-person singular simple present languishes, present participle languishing, simple past and past participle languished)

  1. (intransitive) To lose strength and become weak; to be in a state of weakness or sickness.
    • We […] do languish of such diseases.1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, 2 Esdras 8:31
  2. (intransitive) To pine away in longing for something; to have low spirits, especially from lovesickness.
    • He languished without his girlfriend.
  3. (intransitive) To live in miserable or disheartening conditions.
    • He languished in prison for years.
    Synonyms:
    rot
  4. (intransitive) To be neglected; to make little progress, be unsuccessful.
    • The case languished for years before coming to trial.
  5. (obsolete, transitive) To make weak; to weaken, devastate.
  6. (archaic, intransitive) To affect a languid air, especially disingenuously.
    • He is an excellent young man, and will suit Harriet exactly: it will be an "exactly so," as he says himself; but he does sigh and languish, and study for compliments rather more than I could endure as a principal.1815, Jane Austen, Emma

Questions about languishes

What is languishes the third-person singular simple present indicative of?
Languishes is the third-person singular simple present indicative of languish.

Words near languishes in the dictionary

  1. languids
  2. languish
  3. languished
  4. languisher
  5. languishers
  6. languishes
  7. languishest
  8. languisheth
  9. languishing
  10. languishingly
  11. languishings

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: languishes (page history and authors); languish (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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