intimacy means feeling or atmosphere of closeness and openness towards someone else, often but not necessarily involving sexuality. It carries an Arena rating of 1356, earned across 3 head-to-head judged battles.
Among words judged in Lexicurio's Arena, intimacy ranks #2,572 of 14,308 for Most Malleable Words, #7,082 of 14,423 for Most Sublime Words, #7,084 of 14,414 for Most Elegant Words, #7,119 of 14,322 for Scariest Words.
intimacy is pronounced /ˈɪn.tɪ.mə.si/.
Why “intimacy” is a great word
Intimacy is a state of profound familiarity, emotional closeness, and mutual understanding between individuals, which may exist with or without physical affection. Formed within English from the adjective 'intimate' (itself from Latin *intimus*, meaning 'innermost, deepest') and the abstract noun suffix '-cy'. Unlike 'solitude,' which shelters the self in aloneness, or 'familiarity,' which often rests on the surface in habits and repeated encounters, intimacy requires a shared, vulnerable journey inward. It is the unspoken language of a shared glance across a crowded room, the profound quiet of two people reading in the same pool of lamplight, and the trust to confess a secret into a listening darkness—the rare agreement to lower the drawbridge to one's innermost keep.
noun
- Feeling or atmosphere of closeness and openness towards someone else, often but not necessarily involving sexuality.“To adulterous lust the most sacred duties are sacrificed, because, before marriage, men, by a promiscuous intimacy with women, learned to consider love as a selfish gratification—learned to separate it not only from esteem, but from the affection merely built on habit, which mixes a little humanity with it.”
- Intimate relationship.“1787, Robert Burns, Letter to Dr. Moore, 23 April, 1787, in J. Logie Robertson (ed.), The Letters of Robert Burns, Selected and Arranged, with an Introduction, London: Walter Scott, 1887, p. 57,
I have formed many intimacies and friendships here, but I am afraid they are all of too tender a construction to bear carriage a hundred and fifty miles.”
- Intimate detail, (item of) intimate information.“He recognized the tone as the one used by friendly sisters to discuss the infirmities of their husbands. It was Shama’s plea to a sister to exchange intimacies, to show support.”
Words closest in meaning
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