''sackcloth'' ▫ᴱᴺ Entries

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''sackcloth'' ▫ᴱᴺ｜Definition｜1st｜20260209193607-00-⌔

sackcloth - Wiktionary, the free dictionary

English

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Noun

sackcloth (countable and uncountable, plural sackcloths)

• A coarse hessian style of cloth used to make sacks.
• (usually with “and ashes”, also figurative) Garments worn as an act of penance.
  • ✤ Synonyms: hairshirt, cilice
  • ✤ After he realised the gravity of his crime he spent some time wearing sackcloth and ashes.
  • ✤ Next you saw her alone, a kneeling penitent at the foot of the crucifix; her long fair hair is unbound, and the sackcloth robe is girded by a cord round her slender shape: her hands are clasped, and tears are flowing fast from the quenched radiance of those shadowy eyes;…¹
  • ✤ No more ashes, no more sackcloth/And an armband made of black cloth/Will someday never more adorn a sleeve²

Etymology

From Middle English sakcloth, sekcloth, sekclath, sekklath. By surface analysis, sack +‎ cloth.

Pronunciation

• Audio (Southern England): 🔊

Printed 2026-06-28.

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Footnotes

1. 1834, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter XVII, in Francesca Carrara. […], volume III, London: Richard Bentley, […], (successor to Henry Colburn), →OCLC, page 144: ↩

2. 1959, “We Will All Go Together When We Go”, in Tom Lehrer (music), An Evening Wasted with Tom Lehrer, performed by Tom Lehrer: ↩

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