lucre

Meaning

Money, riches, or wealth, especially when seen as having a corrupting effect or causing greed, or obtained in an underhanded manner.

Hyphenated as

lu‧cre

Pronounced as (IPA)

/ˈl(j)uː.kə/

Etymology

From Middle English lūcre, lucor, lucour, lucur (“gain in money, profit; money; wages; illicit gain; advantage, benefit”), from Old French lucre or Latin lucrum (“advantage, profit; love of gain, avarice”), from Proto-Indo-European *leh₂w- (“gain, profit”) + *-tlom (variant of *-trom (suffix forming nouns denoting tools or instruments)).