IDIOCY

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does idiocy mean? 

• IDIOCY (noun)
  The noun IDIOCY has 1 sense:

1. extreme mental retardation

  Familiarity information: IDIOCY used as a noun is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• IDIOCY (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Extreme mental retardation

Classified under:

Nouns denoting cognitive processes and contents

Synonyms:

amentia; idiocy

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

backwardness; mental retardation; retardation; slowness; subnormality (lack of normal development of intellectual capacities)

 Context examples 

Neglect it—go on as heretofore, craving, whining, and idling—and suffer the results of your idiocy, however bad and insuperable they may be.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

His free hand went to my throat, and in that moment I knew the bitterest foretaste of death earned by one’s own idiocy.

(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)

“I have worked, I do work,” I cried impetuously, as though he were my judge and I required vindication, and at the same time very much aware of my arrant idiocy in discussing the subject at all.

(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)