straiten
to put into difficulties, especially financial ones: His obligations had straitened him.
to restrict in range, extent, amount, pecuniary means, etc: Poverty straitens one's way of living.
Archaic.
to make narrow.
to confine within narrow limits.
Origin of straiten
1Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024
How to use straiten in a sentence
The hope-sapping loneliness and soul-straitening isolation of what poverty feels like.
This was with the twofold purpose of straitening the enemy, and supplying the Continental army.
The Life of Francis Marion | William Gilmore SimmsIt was, moreover, ‘a straitening of the Queen, who might possibly consent to the one and not to the other.’
Fletcher of Saltoun | G. W. T. Omond
British Dictionary definitions for straiten
/ (ˈstreɪtən) /
(tr; usually passive) to embarrass or distress, esp financially
(tr) to limit, confine, or restrict
archaic to make or become narrow
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
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