FOULNESS

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does foulness mean? 

• FOULNESS (noun)
  The noun FOULNESS has 4 senses:

1. disgusting wickedness and immorality

2. a state characterized by foul or disgusting dirt and refuse

3. (of weather) the badness of the weather

4. the attribute of having a strong offensive smell

  Familiarity information: FOULNESS used as a noun is uncommon.

 Dictionary entry details 

• FOULNESS (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Disgusting wickedness and immorality

Classified under:

Nouns denoting stable states of affairs

Context example:

mouths which speak such foulness must be cleansed

Hypernyms ("foulness" is a kind of...):

dark; darkness; wickedness (absence of moral or spiritual values)

Derivation:

foul (violating accepted standards or rules)

Sense 2

Meaning:

A state characterized by foul or disgusting dirt and refuse

Classified under:

Nouns denoting stable states of affairs

Synonyms:

filth; filthiness; foulness; nastiness

Hypernyms ("foulness" is a kind of...):

unsanitariness (a state that is not conducive to health)

Derivation:

foul (disgustingly dirty; filled or smeared with offensive matter)

Sense 3

Meaning:

(of weather) the badness of the weather

Classified under:

Nouns denoting attributes of people and objects

Synonyms:

foulness; raininess

Context example:

they were wearied with the foulness of the weather

Hypernyms ("foulness" is a kind of...):

badness; severeness; severity (used of the degree of something undesirable e.g. pain or weather)

Sense 4

Meaning:

The attribute of having a strong offensive smell

Classified under:

Nouns denoting attributes of people and objects

Synonyms:

fetidness; foulness; malodorousness; rankness; stinkiness

Hypernyms ("foulness" is a kind of...):

aroma; odor; odour; olfactory property; scent; smell (any property detected by the olfactory system)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "foulness"):

B.O.; body odor; body odour (malodorousness resulting from a failure to bathe)

Derivation:

foul (offensively malodorous)

 Context examples 

There have been from the loins of this very one great men and good women, and their graves make sacred the earth where alone this foulness can dwell.

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)

But he knew life, its foulness as well as its fairness, its greatness in spite of the slime that infested it, and by God he was going to have his say on it to the world.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)