penurious

/pi'njuəriəs/

Thân thiện

He lived a penurious life, saving every penny he could.

Definition

1. Adjective:
   • Extremely unwilling to spend money; stingy: Describes a person who is excessively frugal or miserly, often to the point of denying themselves and others basic comforts or pleasures.
   • Very poor; lacking money for necessities: Describes a state of extreme poverty or financial hardship where one cannot afford basic needs.

Examples of Usage

• Describing stinginess:
  • His penurious habits meant he never contributed to office gifts.
  • Despite his wealth, he led a penurious life, reusing tea bags to save money.
• Describing poverty:
  • The penurious family could not afford proper heating during the winter.
  • After the factory closed, the town was left in a penurious state.

Advanced Usage

• "penurious of": This formal construction emphasizes a severe lack or scarcity of something non-material, such as time, affection, or praise.
  • The manager was penurious of compliments, making his rare praise highly valued.
• Comparative and Superlative Forms: "more penurious," "most penurious." While grammatically correct, these are less common as the adjective already denotes an extreme state.

Variants and Related Words

• Penuriously (adverb): In a stingy or poverty-stricken manner.
  • He lived penuriously, counting every penny.
• Penuriousness (noun): The state or quality of being penurious (either stinginess or poverty).
  • The penuriousness of his existence was heartbreaking.

Synonyms

• For 'stingy': Parsimonious, miserly, niggardly, tightfisted, cheap.
• For 'poor': Impoverished, destitute, indigent, poverty-stricken, impecunious.

Antonyms

• For 'stingy': Generous, lavish, extravagant, munificent, open-handed.
• For 'poor': Wealthy, affluent, prosperous, opulent.

Related Idioms and Phrases

• "Penny-pinching": (Idiom, adjective/noun) Very careful about spending small amounts of money; similar in meaning to the 'stingy' sense of .
  • His penny-pinching ways made the vacation miserable for everyone.
• "To be on the breadline": (Idiom) To be very poor; similar to the 'poverty' sense of .
  • Many families were on the breadline during the recession.

Học thuật

Adjective

1. excessively unwilling to spend
   • parsimonious thrift relieved by few generous impulses
   • lived in a most penurious manner--denying himself every indulgence
2. not having enough money to pay for necessities

Từ đồng nghĩa

• parsimonious
• hard up
• impecunious
• in straitened circumstances
• penniless
• pinched