measly
/ˈmizli/
Word Rarity
Rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 2.79 in modern English
11
Scrabble Score
6
Letters
2
Syllables
6
Unique Chars
Meaning
adj
Particularly of pigs or pork: infected with larval tapeworms or trichinae (parasitic roundworms).
Example Sentences
- "Then take five or six apples, pick out the cores and fill up the holes thus made with flour of brimstone; stop up the holes and cast in the apples to the measly hog."
- "A measly boy, he looked like a tramp, probably one of the street boys from the village, just walked up here and made himself at home, and when I told him to leave, he wouldn't."
- "For one whole day's work all I was given was twenty measly pounds."
- "The visiting tourists eagerly forked over a measly two dollars per group to their guides as payment for their services. This amount was measly sum to the givers, but a princely sum to the takers."
- "So it wasn't a hotel, as I said in my novel, just a measly motel. But to me it was like the First measly motel, and I remember laughing about the things I was saying straight from my unconscious to both his and God's ear."
Etymology
From measle (“singular of measles”) + -y; the word measle is either from Middle Dutch masel (“a blister filled with blood; a pustule, a skin blemish”), or Middle Low German masel (“a red skin blemish”), from Proto-Germanic *masuraz (“a knot or scar in wood; a knarl”), from *mas-, *mēs- (“a spot; a sore; a scar”), from Proto-Indo-European *mos- (“a skin sore”).
Origin
Word Breakdown
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /ˈmizli/
- British English: /ˈmiːzli/
Usage
Subject
Wiktionary places this term in Medicine.