careworn means worn down by cares: showing the signs of long-term stress, tired and haggard due to prolonged worry. It carries an Arena rating of 1896, earned across 9 head-to-head judged battles.
Among words judged in Lexicurio's Arena, careworn ranks #1,191 of 17,138 for Most Incisive Words, #1,261 of 17,126 for Most Elegant Words, #1,915 of 17,127 for Most Vivid Words, #2,962 of 17,127 for Words That Escaped Their Books.
careworn is pronounced /ˈkɛːwɔːn/.
Why “careworn” is a great word
Showing signs of long-term stress or anxiety, appearing tired and haggard from prolonged worry. From care (“sorrow, worry”) + worn (“showing the effects of wear”), first attested in 1828. Unlike “haggard,” which suggests a wild, gaunt exhaustion from physical deprivation, or “weary,” which describes a general fatigue without the specific marks of prolonged anxiety, careworn is the slow erosion of the face by silent, nightly reckonings. It is the permanent furrow in a forehead that no relaxation can smooth, the hollow beneath the eyes that sleep cannot fill, the shoulders that have borne the invisible weight of dread until they sag into a permanent slope—the visible archaeology of a mind that has spent years bracing against what might come.
Etymology
From care (“sorrow, worry”) + worn.
adj
- Worn down by cares: showing the signs of long-term stress, tired and haggard due to prolonged worry.e.g.“The weeks of working hard to look after his sick family left him looking careworn.”
Definitions & examples from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 3.0).
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