verb
definition
To lose good or desirable qualities.
example
His condition continued to degenerate even after admission to hospital.
definition
To cause to lose good or desirable qualities.
Examples of degenerated in a Sentence
It became the granary of Rome and the free population naturally degenerated and died out.
After him Roman history-writing speedily degenerated.
In birds of various groups the clavicles are more or less degenerated, the reduction beginning at the distal end.
The latter, entrusted to irresponsible subordinates, degenerated into a despotism which brought the system into great discredit.
In the middle ages the stimulus to write was mainly of a moral or ecclesiastical nature, though the patriotic impulse which had suggested the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle was perhaps never entirely absent, and the ecclesiastical motive often degenerated into a desire to glorify, sometimes even by forgery, not merely the church as a whole, but the particular monastery to which the writer belonged.
But the crusade degenerated into a jacquerie which ravaged the whole kingdom, and much discredited Bak6cz.
The Fijians were formerly notorious for cannibalism, which may have had its origin in religion, but long before the first contact with Europeans had degenerated into gluttony.
The dress of the upper classes was similar to that of a Scottish Highlander before it degenerated into the present conventional garb of a highland regiment.
The courts of justice became corrupt, administrative power was abused and degenerated into a despotism controlled only by personal considerations, oppressive taxes destroyed industry and gradually desolated the country.
In the century which followed the extinction of the Ascanian house, liberty degenerated into licence, and the country was given over to anarchy.
When young,George was handsome and polished but it would seem he was bored with his life and quickly degenerated into a grossly fat debauchee.
It is under Christopher that we first hear, for instance, of the Vornedskab, or patriarchal control of the landlords over their tenants, a system which degenerated into rank slavery.
Just because you don't know the answer doesn't mean the conversation has degenerated.
No, the conversation hadn't degenerated, though Denton certainly would have insisted so.
The liberty of the press not unfrequently degenerated into licence, and sane liberalism was often replaced by socialistic dreaming.
The chief manufactures are silk brocades, gold and silver thread, gold filigree work, German-silver work, embossed brass vessels and lacquered toys; but the brasswork for which Benares used to be famous has greatly degenerated.
The monarchical government introduced by Deiphontes gave way to an oligarchy, and the oligarchy degenerated into a despotism.
By the middle of the century, logical studies had lost to a great extent their real interest and application, and had degenerated into trivial displays of ingenuity.
Their asceticism degenerated into legalism, their claim to a monopoly of pure Christianity made them arrogant.
Troublesome insects, vampire bats, and the failure to introduce new blood into the degenerated herds, are responsible for its decline.
But the Christian Democracy, which, starting in Belgium and France, had now extended its activity to Italy, Austria and Germany, and was striving to arrive at this solution, degenerated everywhere into a political party.
When Catherine found herself opposed by the policy of France and England, and threatened by the jealousy of Prussia and Austria, she dropped the Greek design, observing to Voltaire that the descendants of the Spartans were much degenerated.
His energy too not infrequently degenerated into violence, and when crossed he was apt to be tyrannical.
The ceremony degenerated into a burlesque in which the ass of the flight became confused with Balaam's ass.
This scheme, with the addition of a pair of trumpets and drums and, occasionally, oboes, forms the normal orchestra of 18th-century Masses developed or degenerated from this model.
Imperialism, which had been excited by Lord Beaconsfields policy in 1878, and by the prospect of a war with a great European power, fell into discredit when it degenerated into a fresh expedition into Afghanistan, and an inglorious war with a savage African tribe.
The game soon degenerated into a midfield battle with neither team able to show much in the way of creativity.
Under these conditions debate sometimes degenerated into quibbles over points of Portuguese grammar.
With all the rain, the ground was very soggy... it quickly degenerated into a muddy quagmire at the jumps.
In Alexander the characteristic virtues of the Jagiellos, patience and generosity, degenerated into slothfulness and extravagance.
The eyes have degenerated to a greater extent than From Gould.
On the sloping hills carob trees, and others both useful and agreeable, still grow abundantly; the vine also holds its place, ands produces a species of wine which was highly valued by the ancients, though it seems to have degenerated greatly in modern times.
There can be no doubt that at this time the true form of Zoroastrianism and the sacred writings were preserved only in Persis, whereas everywhere else (in Parthia, in the Indo-Scythian kingdoms of the east and in the great propagandist movement in Armenia, Syria and Asia Minor, where it developed into Mithraism) it degenerated and was mixed with other cults and ideas.
Of the muscles of the stem or axis, those of the neck and tail are well-developed and specialized, while those of the lower back are more or less reduced, or even completely degenerated owing to the rigidity of this region, brought about by the great antero-posterior extent of the pelvis.
Clement wished the name to be reserved for the eucharist, because the love-feasts of the church had degenerated, as Tertullian too discovered, as soon as he turned Motanist.
In England, where the pear is sometimes considered wild, there is always the doubt that it may not really be so, but the produce of some seed of a cultivated tree deposited by birds or otherwise, which has degenerated into the wild spine-bearing tree known as Pyrus communis.
Subsequently, whether from the fact that such bold speculations were obnoxious to the general sense of propriety in Elea, or from the inferiority of its leaders, the school degenerated into verbal disputes as to the possibility of motion, and similar academic trifling.
The taille servile can scarcely be termed a tax; it was rather a tax which had degenerated into a source of profit for certain individuals.
The small Magyar horse, once famous for its swiftness and endurance, was improved during the Turkish wars, so far as height and beauty were concerned, by being crossed with Arabs; but it degenerated after the 17th century as the result of injudicious crossbreeding.
None of these aims were attained; for the trial, which turned on the evidence of the police spy Nastic (already chief witness in the doubtful Cettinje bomb trial of 1908) degenerated into a public scandal, owing to the conduct of the judges and public prosecutor, and rallied Croat public opinion in defence of the S3 Serb victims. Serbo-Croat solidarity became still more apparent when the Austrian historian Dr. Friedjung, in the Neue Freie Presse of March 25 1909, openly charged the leaders of the Serbo-Croat coalition with being in the pay of Serbia.
In a period varying from twenty-four to thirty hours there is marked evidence of the removal of the degenerated cellular elements in the damaged zone by the mono-nuclear phagocytes.
These appearances are probably due toa pathological mitosis, commonly found in cancer, in which there is an irregular diminution in the number of chromosomes; some are cast out and become degenerated or some pass over to one of the daughter cells, leaving a reduced number in the other, and thus give rise to asymmetrical mitosis.
The bacilli are seen lying as short rods, singly and in clumps, in the caseous and degenerated tissues of the lung.
At the present day both experimental and histological investigations seem to indicate that in the process of calcification there is a combination of the organic substances present in degenerated tissues, or in tissues of low vitality, with the lime salts of the body.
After this decision the controversies about the Person of Christ degenerated into mere hair-splitting; and the interference of the imperial authority from time to time in the dispute was not conducive to the settlement of the questions in the interests of truth alone.
By 1570 the strife had degenerated into a barbarous devastation of border provinces; and in July of the same year both countries accepted the mediation of the Emperor, and peace was finally concluded at Stettin on Dec. 13, 1570.
The Danish rule had, during the centuries following the Reformation, gradually brought Iceland to the verge of economic ruin; the ancient Parliament of the island, which had degenerated to a mere shadow, had been abolished in 1800; all the revenue of Iceland went into the Danish treasury, and only very small sums were spent for the good of the island; but worst of all was the notorious monopoly which gave away the whole trade of Iceland to a single Danish trading company.
This doctrine reaches its height in Plotinus, after whom it degenerated into magic and theurgy in its unsuccessful combat with the victorious Christianity.
This dialectic, initiated by Euclides, became more and more opposed to the testimony of experience; in the hands of Eubulides and Alexinus it degenerated into hairsplitting, mainly in the form of the reductio ad absurdum.
In spite of the fact that in a few of its later representatives Gnosticism assumed a more refined and spiritual aspect, and even produced blossoms of a true and beautiful piety, it is fundamentally and essentially an unstable religious syncretism, a religion in which the determining forces were a fantastic oriental imagination and a sacramentalism which degenerated into the wildest superstitions, a weak dualism fluctuating unsteadily between asceticism and libertinism.