straiten
Americanverb (used with object)
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to put into difficulties, especially financial ones.
His obligations had straitened him.
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to restrict in range, extent, amount, pecuniary means, etc.
Poverty straitens one's way of living.
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Archaic.
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to make narrow.
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to confine within narrow limits.
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verb
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(tr; usually passive) to embarrass or distress, esp financially
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(tr) to limit, confine, or restrict
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archaic to make or become narrow
Etymology
Origin of straiten
Explanation
To straiten is to restrict financially, the way having your rent increase can straiten your circumstances if your salary stays the same. The verb straiten is an old-fashioned one, but it's one way to describe a situation that's been diminished or constrained, usually because of money problems. This meaning derives from an earlier definition, "to restrict or make narrow," from strait, "narrow." If you find your circumstances narrowed by a lack of finances, you'll know what this word is all about.
Vocabulary lists containing straiten
Pygmalion
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Long Walk to Freedom
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"A Day's Work," Excerpt from "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer"
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Tears are in my eyes to feel Thou art made so straitly: Blessings need must straiten too,— Little canst thou joy or do Thou who lovest greatly.
From The Dog's Book of Verse by Various
His most celebrated saying was, " Be constant in meditation on death: if thou bein straitened case 'twill enlarge it, and if in affluence 'twill straiten it upon thee."
From The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night — Volume 02 by Sir Richard Francis Burton
But really when I saw so much goodness, generosity, tenderness, and real honesty, I had not the heart to accept it, for fear he should straiten himself upon my account.
From The Life and Most Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, of York, Mariner (1801) by Daniel Defoe
O love immense and independent, which nothing can limit or straiten!
From Spiritual Torrents by Jeanne Marie Bouvier de la Motte Guyon
What shall we do to spread the wing and soar, Nor straiten thy deliverance any more?
From A Book of Strife in the Form of The Diary of an Old Soul by George MacDonald
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
