abject

[ ab-jekt, ab-jekt ]

adjective

1. utterly hopeless, miserable, humiliating, or wretched:

   abject poverty.

   Synonyms: miserable, degrading

2. contemptible; despicable; base-spirited:

   an abject coward.

   Synonyms: vile, low, mean, base

3. shamelessly servile; slavish.
4. Obsolete. cast aside.

abject

/ ˈæbdʒɛkt /

adjective

1. utterly wretched or hopeless
2. miserable; forlorn; dejected
3. indicating humiliation; submissive

   an abject apology

4. contemptible; despicable; servile

   an abject liar

Derived Forms

• ˈabjectly, adverb
• ˈabjectness, noun
• abˈjection, noun

Other Words From

• ab·jectly adverb
• ab·jectness ab·jected·ness noun
• un·abject adjective
• un·abject·ly adverb
• un·abject·ness noun

Word History and Origins

Origin of abject¹

1400–50; late Middle English < Latin abjectus thrown down (past participle of abicere, abjicere ), equivalent to ab- ab- + -jec- throw + -tus past participle suffix

Word History and Origins

Origin of abject¹

C14: (in the sense: rejected, cast out): from Latin abjectus thrown or cast away, from abjicere, from ab- away + jacere to throw

Example Sentences

Director Naoki Yoshida has said that it was important to the company that a mainline “Final Fantasy” game isn’t regarded as an abject catastrophe.

From Washington Post

I went within a month from having a nanny and living in a nice house and everything to just really abject poverty.

From MIT Technology Review

Our main message is that whoever wins, it will not be enough for him to fix the US’s abject failures in handling the pandemic and to take climate change seriously.

From MIT Technology Review

So this decision to open things back up, right before Labor Day, from people who do believe in collective action to contain this virus, is abject nonsense.

From Voice of San Diego

America’s abject failure to deal adequately with the biggest global health emergency in a century has prompted some experts to argue that the pandemic may serve as a geopolitical inflection point.

From MIT Technology Review

Those facts, Paul said, indicated that Chairman Mao was a tyrannical monster whose people lived “in abject slavery.”

From The Daily Beast

The girls helped their mothers prepare a simple meal as the men smoked outside and reflected on their abject state.

From The Daily Beast

But in any narrative, if the protagonist is going to be at the center of a sea of abject joy and triumph, someone has to lose.

From The Daily Beast

Featuring headache-inducing black-and-red graphics, the Virtual Boy was an abject failure.

From The Daily Beast

No, this brief delay must be a sign that the implementation of the Affordable Care Act is destined to result in abject failure.

From The Daily Beast

A more abject, humiliated man than I stand at this hour in my own eyes never yet took his sins upon his soul.

From Project Gutenberg

The energetic, the daring, the high-spirited go, leaving the residue more abject and nerveless than ever.

From Project Gutenberg

In Scotland, even a beggar has none of those abject manners that denote his class elsewhere.

From Project Gutenberg

Meanwhile a sullen and abject melancholy took possession of his soul.

From Project Gutenberg

In the latter part of his reign, however, the Emperor passed under the dominion of the most abject superstition.

From Project Gutenberg

Related Words

• wretched