decadent

• décadent

From French décadent, a back-formation from décadence (see -ent), from Medieval Latin dēcadentia, from Late Latin dēcadēns, present participle of dēcadō, dēcidō (“sink, fall; perish”), from Latin dē- + cadō (“fall”).^[1]

• IPA^(key): /ˈdɛkədənt/

  • Audio (Southern England):

    (file)

decadent (comparative more decadent, superlative most decadent)

1. Characterized by moral or cultural decline.

   Synonyms: corrupted, degenerate; see also Thesaurus:immoral

   • 1992, Gore Vidal, The Decline and Fall of the American Empire:

     As societies grow decadent, the language grows decadent, too. Words are used to disguise, not to illuminate, action: you liberate a city by destroying it. Words are to confuse, so that at election time people will solemnly vote against their own interests.

2. Luxuriously self-indulgent.

   Synonyms: epicurean, (colloquial) sinful; see also Thesaurus:hedonistic

   • 2003, Hedonismbot in the Futurama episode "The Devil's Hands Are Idle Playthings"

     Surgery in an opera? How wonderfully decadent! And just as I was beginning to lose interest!

• decadence

decadent (plural decadents)

1. A person affected by moral decay.
   • L. Douglas

     He had the fastidiousness, the preciosity, the love of archaisms, of your true decadent.

• decanted

Borrowed from Late Latin dēcadentem.

• IPA^(key): (Central) [də.kəˈðen]
• IPA^(key): (Balearic) [də.kəˈðent]
• IPA^(key): (Valencia) [de.kaˈðent]

decadent m or f (masculine and feminine plural decadents)

1. decaying, deteriorating, in decline
2. decadent (characterized by moral or cultural decline)

• decadència
• decaure

• “decadent”, in Diccionari de la llengua catalana [Dictionary of the Catalan Language] (in Catalan), second edition, Institute of Catalan Studies [Catalan: Institut d'Estudis Catalans], April 2007
• “decadent”, in Gran Diccionari de la Llengua Catalana, Grup Enciclopèdia Catalana, 2025.
• “decadent” in Diccionari normatiu valencià, Acadèmia Valenciana de la Llengua.
• “decadent” in Diccionari català-valencià-balear, Antoni Maria Alcover and Francesc de Borja Moll, 1962.

Borrowed from French décadent.

decadent m or n (feminine singular decadentă, masculine plural decadenți, feminine and neuter plural decadente)

1. decadent

• decadență