A.Word.A.Day --beggar

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Jul 23, 2010

This week's theme
Words that look like one part of speech but are another

This week's words
contumely
panegyric
nebbish
gloaming
beggar

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Words that aren't what they appear to be

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A.Word.A.Day

with Anu Garg

beggar

PRONUNCIATION:

(BEG-uhr)

MEANING:

verb tr.:
1. To exhaust the resources or ability; to defy.
2. To impoverish.

ETYMOLOGY:

From Middle English beggare, beggere, from beggen (to beg).

USAGE:

"Geraldine Feeney said the story told by Mr Boyle beggared belief. 'If I heard him right, a 26-year-old is in a mental institution for five years because someone belonging to her thinks she will be promiscuous if she is out in the world.'"
Jimmy Walsh; Call for Review of Psychiatric 'Detention'; The Irish Times (Dublin); Jun 23, 2010.

See more usage examples of beggar in Vocabulary.com's dictionary.

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:

Pride, like laudanum and other poisonous medicines, is beneficial in small, though injurious in large, quantities. No man who is not pleased with himself, even in a personal sense, can please others. -Frederick Saunders, librarian and essayist (1807-1902)

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