penury

noun pen·u·ry \ ˈpen-yə-rē \

Definition of penury

1 :a cramping and oppressive lack of resources (such as money); especially :severe poverty

2 :extreme and often stingy frugality

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Examples of penury in a Sentence

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

Recent Examples of penury from the Web

Lawrence’s visionary art expressed the large-scale, up-from-slavery yearning that took agrarian folk to the industrialized cities — from penury to working-class potential — and transformed the American North.

— armond white, National Review, "Kathryn Bigelow Does the Wrong Thing in Detroit," 4 Aug. 2017
Mikhail and Margarita, by Julie Lekstrom Himes (Europa). Blacklisted by the Soviet authorities, Mikhail Bulgakov, the great Russian satirist, spent much of the nineteen-thirties unpublished and living in penury.

— maria konnikova, The New Yorker, "Briefly Noted," 22 May 2017
If Laura can land a husband, Mama Wingfield believes she and the family - abandoned by Papa Wingfield years before - will be saved from a lifetime of penury and worry.

— andrea simakis, cleveland.com, "George Brant's 'Salvage' at None Too Fragile a compelling variation on a theme by Tennessee Williams (review)," 10 May 2017
After all, Obama is not like Harry Truman, who faced penury in retirement.

— dominic tierney, The Atlantic, "Obama Faces the Ex-President's Dilemma," 9 May 2017
Hudson at first found only penury and illness, a bearded figure in threadbare clothes, impoverished and solitary, attempting to eke out life as a writer.

— javier pierini, Smithsonian, "The Naturalist Who Inspired Ernest Hemingway and Many Others to Love the Wilderness," 2 May 2017
In the span of a single generation, hundreds of millions of people were lifted from penury to unimagined riches.

— marc levinson, WSJ, "Why the Economy Doesn’t Roar Anymore," 14 Oct. 2016
As the Confederacy lurches toward defeat, the group’s numbers increase, drawing other deserters, runaway slaves, and farmers reduced to penury, and Newton turns the band into an effective fighting force.

— richard brody, The New Yorker, "The Historical Imagination and “Free State of Jones”," 23 June 2016
Louisiana Elefante, an angelic-looking orphan living with her grandmother in penury, sets her wide eyes on the prize money — confident that the winnings will keep her out of the county home and the clutches of the mysterious Marsha Jean.

— amber dermont, New York Times, "Kate DiCamillo’s ‘Raymie Nightingale’," 5 May 2016

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'penury.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

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?"

Origin and Etymology of penury

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

NEW! Time Traveler

First Known Use: 14th century

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penury Synonyms

Synonyms

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

Antonyms

affluence, opulence, richness, wealth, wealthiness

Related Words

gutter, misery, woe, wretchedness; exigency; emergency, rainy day; austerity, deprivation, privation; bankruptcy, insolvency; belt-tightening, pinching, straitening

Near Antonyms

luxury, prosperity

Synonym Discussion of 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.