Sunlessness

noun

noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    The state or characteristic of being without the sun or sunshine. uncountable

    "In Penzance and Falmouth, the total eclipse will last for 2 minutes 2 seconds. The longest period of sunlessness will be in Romania, at 2 mins 23 seconds."

  2. 2
    Dreariness, joylessness. figuratively, uncountable

    "The honor she paid the honesty of these women helped her much to pity the sunlessness of their existence, and the poor end for which they lived."

Example

More examples

"In Penzance and Falmouth, the total eclipse will last for 2 minutes 2 seconds. The longest period of sunlessness will be in Romania, at 2 mins 23 seconds."

Etymology

From sunless + -ness.

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