closefisted

American  

[klohs-fis-tid] / ˈkloʊsˈfɪs tɪd /

Or close-fisted

adjective

1. stingy; miserly; tight.

   Synonyms:

   tight-fisted, penurious

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Other Word Forms

• closefistedly adverb
• closefistedness noun

Etymology

Origin of closefisted

First recorded in 1565–75; close + fist ¹ + -ed ³

Explanation

If you're so stingy that you can't stand to spend any money, not even to buy your adorable little cousin an ice cream cone, you are closefisted. People who prefer to hang onto their money are closefisted, especially if they aren't generous to others. You might also describe them as penny-pinching or call them tightwads. All of these terms provide clear images of hands clutching money tightly inside them — closefisted came first, around 1800, and tightwad followed about a hundred years later. The opposite of being closefisted, fittingly, is to be openhanded.

Example Sentences

The best example was the Pullman Sleeping Car strike of 1894, which was provoked by the monstrously closefisted George Pullman and was poised to expand into a nationwide rail strike.

From Los Angeles Times • Nov. 29, 2022

It might have been nice to have had more respite to appreciate Mays’s closefisted Scrooge, his liberal Cratchit and sweet Fan.

From New York Times • Nov. 21, 2022

Normally closefisted, Louis showered money on her innumerable "projects"�the porcelain factory of S�vres, paintings, sculptures, villas, rewards and pensions for artists and builders�a grand total, it is said, of 36 million livres.

From Time Magazine Archive

Only her maman, Madame Teterger, a closefisted harridan who runs the clinic and everybody in it, dares face him.

From Time Magazine Archive

Whatever an air of indifference he would assume in his grandee role of "art collector," yet in most other matters he was inveterately closefisted.

From Great Fortunes from Railroads by Myers, Gustavus