difficultness

C2+ Topic:Describing Qualities

US /ˈdɪfɪkəltnɪs/ UK /ˈdɪfɪkəltnəs/ See IPA manual

noun

Meanings

1

noun
the quality of being difficult or troublesome

The sheer difficultness of the terrain slowed their advance.

Thesaurus

Synonyms

1 noun · the quality of being... difficulty hardnessarduousnesstroublesomenessawkwardness

Opposites

ease easiness simplicity

Word family

Related forms difficult difficulty

Etymology

From the adjective difficult plus the suffix -ness; difficult is a back-formation from difficulty, from Latin difficultas, from difficilis ('hard, not easy'), from dis- ('not') plus facilis ('easy').

difficilis Latin facilis Latin facere Latin *dʰeh₁- Proto-Indo-European

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Topics

Describing Qualities Word Formation & Derivatives

# difficultness

**Type:** Word
**Level:** C2+
**Part of speech:** noun
**IPA (US):** ˈdɪfɪkəltnɪs
**IPA (UK):** ˈdɪfɪkəltnəs

## Meanings
1. the quality of being difficult or troublesome

## Examples
- The sheer difficultness of the terrain slowed their advance.

## Synonyms
- difficulty
- hardness
- arduousness
- troublesomeness
- awkwardness

## Antonyms
- ease
- easiness
- simplicity

## Related Forms
- difficult
- difficulty

## Roots and Affixes
- Root: difficilis
- Root: facilis
- Root: facere
- Root: *dʰeh₁-

## Etymology
From the adjective difficult plus the suffix -ness; difficult is a back-formation from difficulty, from Latin difficultas, from difficilis ('hard, not easy'), from dis- ('not') plus facilis ('easy').

## AI Etymology
Difficultness is from the adjective difficult plus the suffix -ness; difficult is a back-formation from difficulty, from Latin difficultas, from difficilis ('hard, not easy'), from dis- ('not') plus facilis ('easy'). The ancestry passes through Latin difficilis, Latin facilis, Latin facere, and Proto-Indo-European *dʰeh₁-. The prefix dis- often marks separation, reversal, or negation in Latin and English formations, helping to explain the word's surface structure; the suffix -ness marks an abstract noun of quality or state, so the English form is shaped by recognizable word formation as well as by its inherited or borrowed base. In present use as a noun, it means "the quality of being difficult or troublesome", keeping the historical formation close to the word's ordinary semantic work. Related words include difficult and difficulty.

## Topics
- Describing Qualities
- Word Formation & Derivatives

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