Imbecile

//ɪmbəˈsiːl// adj, noun

adj, noun ·Common ·High school level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    A person with limited mental capacity who can perform tasks and think only like a young child, in medical circles meaning a person who lacks the capacity to develop beyond the mental age of a normal five- to seven-year-old child. obsolete

    "It is an offence for a man to have unlawful sexual intercourse with a woman whom he knows to be an idiot or imbecile."

  2. 2
    a person of subnormal intelligence wordnet
  3. 3
    A fool, an idiot. derogatory

    "VLADIMIR: Because he wouldn't save them. / ESTRAGON: From hell? / VLADIMIR: Imbecile! From death."

Adjective
  1. 1
    Destitute of strength, whether of body or mind; feeble; impotent; especially, mentally weak. dated

    "hospitals for the imbecile and insane"

Adjective
  1. 1
    having a mental age of three to seven years wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms
idiotimbecilicabsurdaddle-brainairheadament

Example

More examples

""Idiot," "moron," and "imbecile" were all once scientific terms referring to specific IQ ranges."

Etymology

From Middle French imbécile, from Latin imbēcillus (“weak, feeble”), literally “without a staff”.

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.