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# meagre

adjective (meagre — UK, Ireland, Australia, NZ; meager — US; more meagre, most meagre)

«meagre» in the English dictionary: everyday — its meanings, how the lessons use it, and examples, each with its tree on Mova.

## Everyday

1. Small in amount, not enough: «a meagre meal», «meagre wages». [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/M/meagre/#m1)
2. (old) Thin, lean. [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/M/meagre/#m2)

### In the lessons

In history lessons on poverty, war and workhouses, people lived on meagre food and meagre pay. In stories it shows hardship: In maths word problems, a meagre amount is a small one.

### Examples

- The prisoners ate a meagre meal of bread and water. [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/M/meagre/#x1)
- They lived on a meagre wage. [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/M/meagre/#x2)
- We had a meagre harvest after the dry summer. [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/M/meagre/#x3)
- His meagre savings were not enough for a bike. [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/M/meagre/#x4)
- The soup was meagre and thin. [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/M/meagre/#x5)
- In the war, families had meagre rations. [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/M/meagre/#x6)
- She did not touch it; and the next morning she went off again without taking the meagre breakfast which was left out for her. [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/M/meagre/#x7)

### Note

Spelling: meagre (UK) / meager (US). Pronounced MEE-guh. Similar: scant, scanty, small. Opposite: plentiful, generous.

## On Mova

- [Trees and pragmatics of «meagre» in the school dictionary](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/M/meagre/): every meaning and example parsed by Mova, with its dependency tree and frames.
- [«meagre» in the school dictionary](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/dictionaries/school/w/meagre.html) on Mova free.