greed
/ɡɹiːd/
Word Rarity
Rare
Frequency: 3.73 in modern English
7
Scrabble Score
5
Letters
1
Syllables
4
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
A selfish or excessive desire for more than is needed or deserved, especially of money, wealth, food, or other possessions.
Uncountable
Example Sentences
- "His greed was his undoing."
- "[…]But when I had bestridden the plank, quoth I to myself, "Thou deserveth all that betideth thee. All this is decreed to me of Allah (whose name be exalted!), to turn me from my greed of gain, whence ariseth all that I endure, for I have wealth galore.""
- "Your market gardener is not a well-breeched man, dependant as he is on the imponderables of glut, the inequities of distribution, and the greeds of wholesaler and retailer."
- "She does not display voracities and greeds like a number of patients […] nor has she shown any significant tendency to possessiveness, grievance, paranoia, or mania."
- "The point is, ladies and gentleman, that greed, for lack of a better word, is good. Greed is right, greed works. Greed clarifies, cuts through, and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit. Greed, in all of its forms; greed for life, for money, for love, knowledge has marked the upward surge of mankind."
- "The ravens sit greeding, / And watching, and heeding: / Thoro' wind, over water, / Comes scent of the slaughter, / And ravens sit greeding / Their share of the bones."
Etymology
c. 1600. Back-formation from greedy.