impunity
noun
Did you know?
Impunity, like the words pain, penal, and punish, traces to the Latin noun poena, meaning "punishment." Poena, in turn, came from the Greek poinē, meaning "payment" or "penalty." Impunity has been around since the 1500s; in 1660, Englishman Roger Coke wrote "This unlimited power of doing anything with impunity, will only beget a confidence in kings of doing what they [desire]." While royals may act with impunity more easily than others, the word impunity can be applied to beings great and small. Take, for example, this 2023 quote from the Sidmouth Herald in England: "The [yew tree] fruits are readily eaten by birds but they do not digest the seeds as they are poisonous. Only one bird, the rare and shy Hawfinch, is able to eat the seeds with impunity."
Examples of impunity in a Sentence
Bruce Y. Lee, Forbes.com, 1 Aug. 2025
Cab drivers breaking the law with apparent impunity is damaging to visitors to the city, especially since Navy Pier, for all its success, has no light rail or other visitor-friendly transportation to get people over there.
—The Editorial Board, Chicago Tribune, 27 July 2025
Access to justice too (something often underrated), where you can’t be killed or robbed with impunity, and where you won’t be arbitrarily deprived of your liberty or your freedom of speech by a despotic government.
—Simon Boas
july 23, Literary Hub, 23 July 2025
When seeing injustice portrayed on the screen, viewers brought with them the images that have been burned into global consciousness after nearly two years of siege on Gaza—images of children killed, hospitals bombed, and international law flouted with impunity.
—Faisal Kutty, MSNBC Newsweek, 23 July 2025
See All Example Sentences for impunity
Cite this Entry
“Impunity.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/impunity. Accessed 5 Aug. 2025.
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impunity
noun
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