Definition of "decrepitude" [de•crep•i•tude]

• The quality or condition of being weakened, worn out, impaired, or broken down by old age, illness, or hard use. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "The most apropos description of this cycle of inherent decrepitude is perhaps the Yiddish word schlock, meaning something "cheap, shoddy, or inferior.""
• "Alas, no one understands that the world is sinking on the ocean of Time that is so very deep and that is infested with those huge crocodiles called decrepitude and death."
• "The last two stages, old age — up to seventy years — and the remaining years of very old age or "decrepitude," are the periods in life in which people "have very weak natural heat [and] the superfluities increase.""