meager
[mee-ger]
- deficient in quantity or quality; lacking fullness or richness; scanty; inadequate: a meager salary; meager fare; a meager harvest.
- having little flesh; lean; thin: a body meager with hunger.
- maigre.
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Also especially British, mea·gre.
Origin of meager
1300–50; Middle English megre < Old French maigre < Latin macer lean
Synonyms
See more synonyms for meager on Thesaurus.comDictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018
Examples from the Web for meagerly
Historical Examples
In the evening he complimented Alfred meagerly on his proficiency as a whip.
Watch Yourself Go ByAl. G. Field
There were several forts in the Indian country, but they were meagerly garrisoned.
Four American IndiansEdson L. Whitney
It was a tiny room, whitewashed; meagerly and nondescriptly furnished.
Out of the AirInez Haynes Irwin
The Romans were perhaps the first who introduced that art into Britain, meagerly as they did introduce it.
On the Portraits of English Authors on Gardening,Samuel Felton
They found nothing but two meagerly furnished houses, apparently recently deserted.
Motor Matt's Air ShipStanley R. Matthews
Word Origin and History for meagerly
meager
adj.
late 14c. (late 12c. as a surname), "lean, thin, emaciated" (of persons or animals), from Old French megre, maigre "thin" (12c.), from Latin macrum (nominative macer) "lean, thin" (source of Spanish, Portuguese, and Italian magro), from PIE *makro- (see macro-). Of material things (land, food, etc.) from early 15c. Cognate Germanic words (Old Norse magr "thin," Old High German magar, German mager, Middle Dutch magher, Dutch mager, Old English mæger) come directly from the PIE root via Proto-Germanic *magras and are not from Latin.
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Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper