sameness

same +‎ -ness

sameness (plural samenesses)

1. the quality of being the same; identity
   • 1922, Sinclair Lewis, Babbitt, New York: Harcourt, Brace & Co., Chapter XXXIV, p. 391,

     All of them agreed that the working-classes must be kept in their place; and all of them perceived that American Democracy did not imply any equality of wealth, but did demand a wholesome sameness of thought, dress, painting, morals, and vocabulary.

   • 1997, Thomas Mann, Doctor Faustus, translated by John E. Woods, New York: Vintage, 1999, Chapter XX, p. 182,

     However strange it may sound, it always seemed to me […] that Adrian's laughter-filled friendship with Schildknapp had something to do with the sameness of their eye color

2. the state of being equivalent; equality
3. a tiring lack of variety; monotony
   • 1855, Walt Whitman, "A Song of Joys" in Leaves of Grass, New York: The Modern Library, 1921, p. 157,

     O to sail to sea in a ship! / To leave this steady unendurable land, / To leave the tiresome sameness of the streets, the sidewalks and the houses, / To leave you, O you solid motionless land, and enter a ship, / To sail and sail and sail!

   • 1860, George Eliot, The Mill on the Floss, Book IV, Chapter II,

     […] in the time when day follows day in dull, unexpectant sameness, and trial is a dreary routine,—it is then that despair threatens […]

• (quality of being the same): See Thesaurus:sameness
• (state of being equivalent): See Thesaurus:equality
• (tiring lack of variety): See Thesaurus:tedium