From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.44 [gcide]:
Difficulty \Dif"fi*cul*ty\, noun; pl. {Difficulties}. [L. difficultas, fr. difficilis difficult; dif- = dis- + facilis easy: cf. F. difficult['e]. See {Facile}.]
1. The state of being difficult, or hard to do; hardness; arduousness; -- opposed to {easiness} or {facility}; as, the difficulty of a task or enterprise; a work of difficulty.
Not being able to promote them [the interests of life] on account of the difficulty of the region. --James Byrne.
2. Something difficult; a thing hard to do or to understand; that which occasions labor or perplexity, and requires skill and perseverance to overcome, solve, or achieve; a hard enterprise; an obstacle; an impediment; as, the difficulties of a science; difficulties in theology.
They lie under some difficulties by reason of the emperor's displeasure. --Addison.
3. A controversy; a falling out; a disagreement; an objection; a cavil.
Measures for terminating all local difficulties. --Bancroft.
4. Embarrassment of affairs, especially financial affairs; -- usually in the plural; as, to be in difficulties.
In days of difficulty and pressure. --Tennyson.
Syn: Impediment; obstacle; obstruction; embarrassment; perplexity; exigency; distress; trouble; trial; objection; cavil. See {Impediment}.
From WordNet (r) 2.0 [wn]:
noun
1: an effort that is inconvenient; "I went to a lot of trouble"; "he won without any trouble"; "had difficulty walking"; "finished the test only with great difficulty" [syn: {trouble}]
2: a factor causing trouble in achieving a positive result or tending to produce a negative result; "serious difficulties were encountered in obtaining a pure reagent"
3: a condition or state of affairs almost beyond one's ability to deal with and requiring great effort to bear or overcome; "grappling with financial difficulties"
4: the quality of being difficult; "they agreed about the difficulty of the climb" [syn: {difficultness}] [ant: {ease}]
From Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0 [moby-thes]:
168 Moby Thesaurus words for "difficulty": Gordian knot, abstruseness, adverse circumstances, adversity, affliction, aggravation, agreement to disagree, altercation, annoyance, arduousness, asperity, bad news, bedevilment, beef, bickering, blight, block, blockade, bore, bother, botheration, bothersomeness, bottleneck, bummer, burden, burthen, care, cargo, catch, challenge, charge, complexity, complication, controversy, cordon, crabbedness, crampedness, crashing bore, cross, cross-purposes, cumbrance, curse, curtain, deadweight, deepness, demurral, demurrer, determent, deterrent, devilment, difference, difference of opinion, difficulties, dilemma, disadvantage, disagreement, disparity, dispute, distress, dividedness, division, dogging, downer, drag, drawback, embarrassment, emergency, encumbrance, esoterica, exasperation, exigency, falling-out, fight, fix, formidableness, freight, hamper, handicap, hang-up, harassment, hard knocks, hard life, hard lot, hardcase, hardness, hardship, harrying, hassle, hazard, headache, heavy sledding, hindrance, hitch, hot water, hounding, hurdle, impediment, impedimenta, imposition, inconvenience, intricacy, irritation, jam, joker, knottiness, laboriousness, load, lumber, mess, misunderstanding, molestation, nuisance, objection, obstacle, obstruction, obstructive, odds, one small difficulty, onus, pack, painfulness, pass, penalty, persecution, pest, pickle, pinch, pitfall, plight, polarization, predicament, pressure, problem, profoundness, profundity, protest, quandary, question, reconditeness, remonstrance, remonstration, rigor, rub, scrape, sea of troubles, snag, squabble, strain, strait, straits, stress, stress of life, stumbling block, stumbling stone, trial, tribulation, trouble, troubles, vale of tears, variance, vexation, vexatiousness, vicissitude, vigor, weight, white elephant, worriment, worry
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