agenbite

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English

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Alternative forms

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Etymology

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Learned borrowing from Middle English ayenbite, reflecting Old English agēn (again, eft, back).

Pronunciation

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Noun

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agenbite (uncountable)

  1. (often purposely archaic) remorse, ayenbite
    • 1922 February, James Joyce, Ulysses, Paris: Shakespeare and Company, [], →OCLC:
      Speaking to me. They wash and tub and scrub. Agenbite of inwit. Conscience.
    • 1998, Marshall McLuhan, The Agenbite of Outwit:
      A special property of all social extensions of the body is that they return to plague the inventors in a kind of agenbite of outwit.'
    • 2008, David Koffler, How Jewy Should We Want Our Presidents To Be?:
      But more to the point here, the agenbite is, if not a Jewish condition, then more pervasive among Jews than any other group, by a wide margin.
    • 2005, James Rother, A Review of An Lauterbach:
      [] habitude of writers challenged by the affliction of an over-agenbite and inwit to match.

Anagrams

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