beggary

plural beggaries

1. countableuncountableThe state of a beggar; indigence, extreme poverty.

   1782, Frances Burney, Cecilia, London: T. Payne & Son and T. Cadell, Volume I, Book I, Chapter 9, p. 128, […] she does not come hither as a beggar, however well the state of beggary may accord with her poverty: she only sollicits the payment of a bill […]

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   Happily some haplesse man hath conscience, And for his conscience lives in beggary.

   c. 1589–1590 (date written), Christopher Marlo[we], edited by Tho[mas] Heywood, The Famous Tragedy of the Rich Iew of Malta. […], London: […] I[ohn] B[eale] for Nicholas Vavasour, […], published 1633, →OCLC, Act I

   Well, whiles I am a beggar, I will rail And say there is no sin but to be rich; And being rich, my virtue then shall be To say there is no vice but beggary.

   c. 1596 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Life and Death of King Iohn”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene i]

   The matter to be decided involved, in addition to the personal risks of life and liberty, the probable forfeiture of an immense estate, and the beggary, in consequence, of an only and beloved daughter.

   1835, William Gilmore Simms, The Partisan, Harper, Chapter XII, page 150

   There was, clearly, no future for him but beggary and a death in the workhouse.

   1933 January 9, George Orwell [pseudonym; Eric Arthur Blair], chapter XXX, in Down and Out in Paris and London, London: Victor Gollancz […], →OCLC

2. countableuncountableThe fact or action of begging.

   […] perhaps he would abandon beggary when there was no poor fool about to beg from.

   1938, Xavier Herbert, chapter 8, in Capricornia, New York: Appleton, page 126

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   […] the landlady […] ushered them into a large garret where twenty or thirty people of all ages and both sexes lay and dozed away the day, choosing the evening and night for their trades of beggary, thieving, or prostitution.

   1848, Elizabeth Gaskell, chapter 38, in Mary Barton

3. countableuncountableBeggarly appearance.

   […] she looked back to the freedom and the beggary of the old studio in Soho with so much regret, that everybody, herself included, fancied she was consumed with grief for her father.

   1847 January – 1848 July, William Makepeace Thackeray, chapter 2, in Vanity Fair […], London: Bradbury and Evans […], published 1848, →OCLC

comparative more beggary · superlative most beggary

1. obsoletebeggarly

   beggary counterfeits

   c. 1597, Ben. Jonson, A Pleasant Comedy, Called: The Case is Alterd. […], London: […] [Nicholas Okes] for Bartholomew Sutton, and William Barrenger, […], published 1609, →OCLC, (please specify the act number in uppercase Roman numerals, and the scene number in lowercase Roman numerals)

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   early 1600s, Beaumont and Fletcher (attributed), The Nice Valour, Act V, Scene 3, in The Works of Mr. Francis Beaumont, and Mr. John Fletcher, London: J. & R. Tonson and S. Draper, 1750, Volume 10, p. 359, This is Love’s beggary right, that now is ours, When Ladies love, and cannot shew their Powers.