LESSENED

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does lessened mean? 

• LESSENED (adjective)
  The adjective LESSENED has 2 senses:

1. impaired by diminution

2. decreased in severity; made less harsh

  Familiarity information: LESSENED used as an adjective is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• LESSENED (adjective)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Impaired by diminution

Synonyms:

diminished; lessened; vitiated; weakened

Similar:

impaired (diminished in strength, quality, or utility)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Decreased in severity; made less harsh

Similar:

mitigated (made less severe or intense)

 Context examples 

Several changes of day and night passed, and the orb of night had greatly lessened, when I began to distinguish my sensations from each other.

(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)

Miss Bennet's astonishment was soon lessened by the strong sisterly partiality which made any admiration of Elizabeth appear perfectly natural; and all surprise was shortly lost in other feelings.

(Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen)

The pain of his continued residence in Highbury, however, must certainly be lessened by his marriage.

(Emma, by Jane Austen)

I could gather from the comments of the experienced Corinthians around me, and from the remarks of the crowd behind, that Harrison’s chance was thought to have been lessened by this round.

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

I found my terror gradually lessened, but my hatred and contempt seemed to increase.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

The study also found that a novel therapeutic approach that specifically targets the E. faecalis strain lessened alcohol-associated liver disease in mice.

(Bacteriophage therapy may ease severity of alcoholic hepatitis, National Institutes of Health)

Such personal praise might have struck her, especially as it did not appear to Anne that the freckles were at all lessened.

(Persuasion, by Jane Austen)

Even if Australia’s fires persist at their current rate, the concentration of particles can be lessened by local circumstances.

(Australian bushfire smoke drifts to South America, SciDev.Net)

But the privations, or rather the hardships, of Lowood lessened.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

But Miss Price had not been brought up to the trade of coming out; and had she known in what light this ball was, in general, considered respecting her, it would very much have lessened her comfort by increasing the fears she already had of doing wrong and being looked at.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)