What does lechery mean?
Lechery is a chiefly literary noun for lustful sexual desire or indulgence, especially when it is treated as a vice or moral failing. Rather than describing an affectionate or consensual relationship, the word usually focuses on excessive or unrestrained appetite, often in a formal or moralizing context. In older usage it could also refer more broadly to excessive indulgence, but its dominant modern sense is sexual. Because of that association and its old-fashioned tone, lechery appears more often in literature, religious or political prose, and historical description than in everyday conversation. The word is more pointed than merely sexual behavior and more disapproving than the neutral term sex: it implies uncontrolled appetite, moral corruption, or a fixation on pleasure. Even so, it remains useful when precision about tone matters. Calling conduct lechery can characterize both the behavior and the cultural or moral atmosphere in which it occurs, while avoiding the clinical distance of a more technical description.
nounLustful or excessive sexual desire and indulgence, especially when regarded as a vice. In older usage, it can also mean excessive or unrestrained indulgence in a pleasure or appetite.
- Lustful or excessive sexual desire and indulgence, especially when regarded as a moral vice.
- Excessive or unrestrained indulgence in a pleasure or appetite, now a largely historical or literary sense.
"The preacher denounced the lechery of the court, where power and pleasure had become inseparable."
"The preacher denounced the lechery of the court, where power and pleasure had become inseparable."
"Despite decades of ridicule, the novel treats his lechery as a genuine moral disorder rather than a comic trait."
Lechery is normally used as an uncountable mass noun; the plural is rare and chiefly literary or archaic.
"The court chronicles attributed many of the dynasty's troubles to the ruler's lecheries."
Once a broad word for excessive indulgence, lechery is now almost unmistakably associated with unrestrained sexual appetite.
Reviewed by Deb Chak, Editor. AI-assisted content curated by RJS Tech Solutions LLP.
Where does lechery come from?
The word entered Middle English as lecherie, borrowed from Anglo-French and Old French forms. Its French ancestry is traced to lecher, meaning “to lick,” from Latin lambere, an original verb for licking; licking served as a metaphor for sensual appetite. The English word narrowed toward sexual lust and indulgence, while related words such as lecher and lecherous preserved similar associations.
How lechery is actually used
The word is chiefly literary, formal, and somewhat archaic. It normally carries a strongly disapproving or moralizing tone and is more common in literature, religious or political prose, and historical description than in everyday conversation.
Easily confused with lechery
A lecher is a person characterized by lustfulness, whereas lechery denotes lustful or excessive sexual behavior or desire.