penury

noun

pen·​u·​ry ˈpen-yə-rē 

1

: a cramping and oppressive lack of resources (such as money)

especially : severe poverty

2

: extreme and often stingy frugality

Did you know?

The exact meaning of "penury" (from Latin penuria, meaning "want") can vary a bit from context to context. It sometimes has had a broad sense of "lack" or "scarcity," as when one character remarks on another's "penury of conversation" in Jane Austen's Emma. It can also mean "frugality," as in Edith Wharton's description of an excessively thrifty hostess in The Age of Innocence: "Her relatives considered that the penury of her table discredited the Mingott name, which had always been associated with good living." The most common sense of "penury," however, is simply "poverty," as in Shakespeare's As You Like It: "Shall I keep your hogs, and eat husks with them? What prodigal portion have I spent that I should come to such penury?"

Synonyms

• beggary
• destituteness
• destitution
• impecuniosity
• impecuniousness
• impoverishment
• indigence
• necessity
• need
• neediness
• pauperism
• penuriousness
• poorness
• poverty
• want

Choose the Right Synonym for penury

poverty, indigence, penury, want, destitution mean the state of one with insufficient resources.

poverty may cover a range from extreme want of necessities to an absence of material comforts.

the extreme poverty of the slum dwellers

indigence implies seriously straitened circumstances.

the indigence of her years as a graduate student

penury suggests a cramping or oppressive lack of money.

a catastrophic illness that condemned them to years of penury

want and destitution imply extreme poverty that threatens life itself through starvation or exposure.

lived in a perpetual state of want

the widespread destitution in countries beset by famine

Examples of penury in a Sentence

lived in a time when single women like herself faced a lifetime of genteel penury

Recent Examples on the Web

One of Thompson’s signature innovations was to use a predictive algorithm to kick ailing and disabled Medicare patients out of nursing homes and rehabilitative programs, causing untold misery and penury. —Jessica Winter, The New Yorker, 13 Dec. 2024

Still, the movement to end dependency and penury in old age gathered force and triumphed with the enactment of Social Security in 1935, the crowning achievement of the New Deal. —Jonathan Rauch, The Atlantic, 10 Dec. 2024

Anderson renders her character’s slow descent into virtual penury and laudanum addiction a genuinely heartrending experience, and her late-in-the-film breakdown about her uselessness stands as one of the decade’s great acting feats. —Indiewire Staff, IndieWire, 12 Aug. 2024

There’s a growing number of technocrats, business leaders and academics who see the current crisis in Gaza as the opportunity to confront the risk of Haredim pulling the country toward theocratic penury. —Tribune News Service, Hartford Courant, 29 Mar. 2024

Word History

Etymology

Middle English, from Latin penuria, paenuria want; perhaps akin to Latin paene almost

First Known Use

14th century, in the meaning defined at sense 1

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Kids Definition

penury

noun

pen·​u·​ry ˈpen-yə-rē 

: extreme poverty