wizened

From wizen +‎ -ed.

Inherited from Middle English wisenen, from Old English wisnian, weosnian, from Proto-Germanic *wisnōjaną. Cognate with Icelandic visna.

• IPA^(key): /ˈwɪzənd/

  • Audio (Southern England):

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• Rhymes: -ɪzənd

wizened

1. simple past and past participle of wizen

wizened (comparative more wizened, superlative most wizened)

1. Withered; lean and wrinkled by shrinkage as from age or illness.
   • 1816, Sir Walter Scott, chapter 8, in Old Mortality:

     "Ill-fard, crazy, crack-brained gowk, that she is!" exclaimed the housekeeper. . . "If it hadna been that I am mair than half a gentlewoman by my station, I wad hae tried my ten nails in the wizen'd hide o' her!"

   • 1907, Jack London, chapter 7, in Before Adam:

     He was old, too, wizened with age, and the hair on his face was gray.

   • 2010 May 13, Richard Corliss, “Cannes: Best-Ever Film by a 101-Year-Old Man”, in Time, retrieved 5 October 2013:

     In the simple fable about old age reconciling itself to memory and destiny, Mastroianni wears the wizened smile of a man who knows he is visiting his youth for the last time.