QUICKNESS

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does quickness mean? 

• QUICKNESS (noun)
  The noun QUICKNESS has 3 senses:

1. skillful performance or ability without difficulty

2. intelligence as revealed by an ability to give correct responses without delay

3. a rate that is rapid

  Familiarity information: QUICKNESS used as a noun is uncommon.

 Dictionary entry details 

• QUICKNESS (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Skillful performance or ability without difficulty

Classified under:

Nouns denoting cognitive processes and contents

Synonyms:

adeptness; adroitness; deftness; facility; quickness

Context example:

he was famous for his facility as an archer

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

skillfulness (the state of being cognitively skillful)

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

touch (deftness in handling matters)

dexterity; manual dexterity; sleight (adroitness in using the hands)

Derivation:

quick (moving quickly and lightly)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Intelligence as revealed by an ability to give correct responses without delay

Classified under:

Nouns denoting cognitive processes and contents

Synonyms:

mental quickness; quick-wittedness; quickness

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

intelligence (the ability to comprehend; to understand and profit from experience)

Derivation:

quick (apprehending and responding with speed and sensitivity)

Sense 3

Meaning:

A rate that is rapid

Classified under:

Nouns denoting attributes of people and objects

Synonyms:

celerity; quickness; rapidity; rapidness; speediness

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

pace; rate (the relative speed of progress or change)

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

fleetness (rapidity of movement)

immediacy; immediateness; instancy; instantaneousness (the quickness of action or occurrence)

despatch; dispatch; expedition; expeditiousness (the property of being prompt and efficient)

promptitude; promptness (the characteristic of doing things without delay)

Derivation:

quick (moving quickly and lightly)

quick (easily aroused or excited)

quick (performed with little or no delay)

quick (accomplished rapidly and without delay)

quick (hurried and brief)

 Context examples 

They must begin with some quickness of sight and hand, and exercise improves them.

(Emma, by Jane Austen)

The other snarled aloud into a savage laugh; and the next moment, with extraordinary quickness, he had unlocked the door and disappeared into the house.

(The Strange Case Of Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

“Do you, ma'am?” cried he, with quickness.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)

Then there was his lightning quickness.

(White Fang, by Jack London)

She was pleased and surprised with the quickness and surety of his mind.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

“They have none of them much to recommend them,” replied he; “they are all silly and ignorant like other girls; but Lizzy has something more of quickness than her sisters.”

(Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen)

The blow was a powerful one; only the diabolical quickness of the Count's leap back saved him.

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)

Wolf Larsen did not seem affected, however; though I noticed, when we returned to the deck, a slight twitching of the nostrils, a perceptible quickness of movement.

(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)

Many rumours had come up to us from the west as to Crab Wilson’s fine science and the quickness of his hitting, but the truth surpassed what had been expected of him.

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Buck’s marvellous quickness and agility stood him in good stead.

(The Call of the Wild, by Jack London)