Old age is the last part of a long life. Reach old age, the illnesses of old age.
Where it starts has moved by about fifteen years within a century. Old age is defined by health rather than by any number, which every doctor knows and no form allows for.
1nounold ageThe last part of a long life.
“He worked until eighty and never mentioned old age.”
old age is a period.
Middle English olde age replaced the older word eld, which survives only in elder and elderly.
Middle English
olde age
English, today
old age
From Middle English olde age, eld age; compare earlier Middle English olde elde (“old age”), alderelde (“old age”), equivalent to old + age. Displaced wholly non-native Middle English vilesse (“old age”) (borrowed from Old French villesce, vieillece (“old age”)) and senectute (“old age”) (from Latin senectūs (“old age”)).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA
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