penury

Meaning

1. (uncountable, usually) Extreme need or want; destitution, poverty; (countable) an instance of this.
2. (countable, poetic, usually) Often followed by of: a lack of something; a dearth, a scarcity.
3. (obsolete, uncountable, usually) The quality of being miserly; miserliness, parsimoniousness, stinginess.

Synonyms

poverty

indigence

destitution

need

want

pauperism

pauperization

distress

privation

lacking

misery

needfulness

neediness

poorness

scarcity

shortage

short of

stinginess

very poor

pain

avarice

necessitousness

dearth

deficiency

emergency

exigency

garrulous

hardship

impoverishment

inadequate

Translations

povertà

penuria

Armut

indigenza

penuria

behoeftigheid

misère

miseria

yoksulluk

pauvreté

ένδεια

Not

geizige

armoede

paupérisme

Pronounced as (IPA)

/ˈpɛnjʊɹi/

Etymology

Cognate with French: pénurie

In summary

From Late Middle English penuri, penurie (“destitution, need, poverty; dearth, lack, scarcity”), borrowed from Latin pēnūria (“need, scarcity, want”) + Middle English -i, -ie (suffix forming abstract and collective nouns); further etymology uncertain, possibly related to paene (“almost, nearly; barely, hardly, scarcely”, adverb), possibly from Proto-Indo-European *peh₁- (“to hate; to hurt”).