English Dictionary

effete

/ɪˈfiːt/

adj

(obsolete) Of substances, quantities etc: exhausted, spent, worn-out. / Lacking strength or vitality; feeble, powerless, impotent. / Decadent, weak through self-indulgence.

The effete substance was no longer useful.

意味（1）

(obsolete) Of substances, quantities etc: exhausted, spent, worn-out.

Nature is not effœte, as he saith, or so lavish, to bestow all her gifts upon an age, but hath reserved some for posterity, to shew her power, that she is still the same, and not old or consumed.

意味（2）

Lacking strength or vitality; feeble, powerless, impotent.

Amid the effete monarchies and princedoms of feudal Europe, morally and materially exhausted by the Thirty Years' War, the only hope of resistance to France lay in the little Republic of merchants, Holland.

意味（3）

Decadent, weak through self-indulgence.

In fact, one obvious project of the MLF […] is to counter the idea that lobster is unusually luxe or unhealthy, suitable only for effete palates or the occasional blow-the-diet treat.

意味（4）

(of a person) Affected, overrefined