# shabby
## English
### Etymology

The adjective is derived from shab (“(obsolete except UK, dialectal) scaly skin disease; skin disease of sheep; crust forming over wound, scab”) +‎ -y (suffix meaning ‘having the quality of’ forming adjectives).
The verb is derived from the adjective.
* Dutch schabbig (“poor, needy, shabby”)
* Middle High German schebic (modern German schäbig (“shabby”))
* Middle Low German schabbich (“miserable”) (modern Low German schabbig, schäbbig)
* Scots shabby (“in poor health, ill”)
* Swedish sjabbig (“shabby, mangy, scruffy”), skabbig (“scabby”)

### Pronunciation

* (Received Pronunciation, General American) IPA: /ˈʃæbi/
* Audio (General American):(file)
* Rhymes: -æbi
* Hyphenation: shab‧by

### Adjective

shabby (comparative shabbier, superlative shabbiest)
* Of clothing, a place, etc.: unkempt and worn or otherwise in poor condition due to age or neglect; scruffy.
    Synonyms: decrepit, moth-eaten, run-down, timeworn, tired; see also Thesaurus:deteriorated, Thesaurus:ramshackle
    They lived in a tiny apartment, with some old, shabby furniture.
** 1838 March – 1839 October, Charles Dickens, “Nicholas seeks to employ himself in a New Capacity, and being unsuccessful, accepts an engagement as Tutor in a Private Family”, in The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby, London: Chapman and Hall, […], published 1839, →OCLC, page 143:[A]s there was a stream of people pouring into a shabby house not far from the entrance, he waited until they had made their way in, […]
** 1867, George MacDonald, “The Bishop’s Basin”, in Annals of a Quiet Neighbourhood […], volume I, London: Hurst and Blackett, publishers, successors to Henry Colburn, […], →OCLC, page 154:[C]ommonplace books are generally new, or at least in fine bindings. And here was a shabby little old book, such as, if it had been commonplace, would not have been likely to be the companion of a young lady at the bottom of a quarry— […]
** 1882, [Mary Elizabeth Braddon], “‘And Pale from the Past We Draw nigh Thee’”, in Mount Royal […], volume II, London: John and Robert Maxwell […], →OCLC, page 179:[They] lived […] in one of the shabbiest streets in the debatable land between Pimlico and Chelsea—by courtesy, South Belgravia.
** 1904–1905, Baroness Orczy [i.e., Emma Orczy], “The Affair at the Novelty Theatre”, in The Case of Miss Elliott, London: T[homas] Fisher Unwin, published 1905, →OCLC; republished as popular edition, London: Greening & Co., 1909, OCLC 11192831, quoted in The Case of Miss Elliott (ebook no. 2000141h.html), Australia: Project Gutenberg of Australia, February 2020:Miss Phyllis Morgan, as the hapless heroine dressed in the shabbiest of clothes, appears in the midst of a gay and giddy throng; she apostrophises all and sundry there, including the villain, and has a magnificent scene which always brings down the house, and nightly adds to her histrionic laurels.
** 1927 May, Virginia Woolf, chapter 5, in To the Lighthouse (Uniform Edition of the Works of Virginia Woolf), new edition, London: Leonard and Virginia Woolf at the Hogarth Press, […], published 1930, →OCLC, part I (The Window), page 47:[T]hings got shabbier and got shabbier summer after summer. The mat was fading; the wall-paper was flapping. You couldn't tell any more that those were roses on it. Still, if every door in a house is left perpetually open, and no lockmaker in the whole of Scotland can mend a bolt, things must spoil.
** 1951 October, R. S. McNaught, “Lines of Approach”, in The Railway Magazine, London: Tothill Press, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 703:Another place where, from the aesthetic point of view, a long tunnel would have been a real blessing, is East London as viewed from the carriage window on the old Great Eastern line. Despite a vast change from crowded slums to tracts of wasteland, due to its grim wartime experience, this approach still provides a shabby and unworthy introduction to the great capital.
* Of a person: wearing ragged or very worn, and often dirty, clothing.
    The fellow arrived looking rather shabby after journeying so far.
** 1765, [Oliver] Goldsmith, “Essay V”, in Essays. […], London: […] W[illiam] Griffin […], →OCLC, page 37:The ſame gentleman, vvhenever he vvanted credit for a ſuit of cloaths, alvvays made the propoſal in a laced coat; for he found by experience, that, if he appeared ſhabby on theſe occaſions, his taylor had taken an oath againſt truſting; […]
** 1782, [Frances Burney], “A Man of Wealth”, in Cecilia, or Memoirs of an Heiress. […], volume I, London: […] T[homas] Payne and Son […], and T[homas] Cadell […], →OCLC, book II, page 156:She told her name, and vvas ſhevvn, by a little ſhabby foot-boy, into a parlour.
** 1882, [Mary Elizabeth Braddon], “And Pale from the Past We Draw Nigh to Thee”, in Mount Royal […], volume II, London: John and Robert Maxwell […], →OCLC, page 179:He was an affectionate brother, always glad to do a good turn to his sisters—who lived with a shabby old half-pay father, […]
* (figurative)
** Of a person, their behaviour, etc.: despicable, mean; also, not generous; stingy, tight-fisted.
    (not generous): Synonyms: ungenerous; see also Thesaurus:stingy
    shabby treatment
*** 1856, W[illiam] M[akepeace] Thackeray, “Of the Loves of Mr. Perkins and Miss Gorgon, and of the Two Great Factions in the Town of Oldborough”, in “The Bedford-Street Conspiracy”, in Miscellanies: Prose and Verse, volume III, London: Bradbury and Evans, […], →OCLC, page 473:It was voted a shabby excuse.
*** 1857, David Livingstone, chapter III, in Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa; […], London: John Murray, […], →OCLC, page 68:I, being more of a native, and familiar with their customs, knew that this shabby present was an insult to us.
*** 1892 January 4 (first performance), W[illiam] S[chwenck] Gilbert, librettist; Alfred Cellier, [Ivan Caryll], composers, […] The Mountebanks, London: Chappell & Co., […], published 1892, →OCLC, Act I, page 11:What shabby things a man will do when he's eaten up with jealousy! But what a comfort those shabby things are to him! […] I'm disgusted with myself for having stooped to such a contemptible act.
** (often in the negative) Poor in quality; also, showing little effort or talent.
    His painting is not too shabby.
*** 1852, William Makepeace Thackeray, “The Campaign of 1707, 1708”, in The History of Henry Esmond, Esq. […] , volume II, London: […] Smith, Elder, & Company, […], →OCLC, page 252:[M]y Lord Duke's entertainments were both ſeldom and ſhabby […]
*** 1865, John Stuart Mill, “Of Some Minor Peculiarities of Doctrine in Sir William Hamilton’s View of Formal Logic”, in An Examination of Sir William Hamilton’s Philosophy, […], London: Longman, Green, Longman, Roberts & Green, →OCLC, page 448:So unlooked-for a paradox required to be defended by the strongest arguments: who, then, would expect such shabby, not arguments, but hints of arguments, as the author presents us with?
*** (medicine, archaic) Of the pulse: thready, weak.
*** (UK, dialectal or informal) Of weather: wet and dreary.
*** (UK, dialectal, veterinary medicine) Chiefly of sheep: affected by shab or scab (“a skin disease”); scabby.

#### Derived terms

* shabbify
* shabbily
* shabbiness
* shabby chic
* shabby-genteel
* shabbyish
* unshabby

#### Translations

    The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.

### Verb

shabby (third-person singular simple present shabbies, present participle shabbying, simple past and past participle shabbied)
* (transitive) To make (something) shabby (adjective sense 1); to shabbify.
* (intransitive) To become shabby; to shabbify.
** 1962, Doris Lessing, “The Golden Notebook”, in The Golden Notebook (Flamingo Modern Classics), London: Flamingo, HarperCollinsPublishers, published 1993, →ISBN, page 544:You'll be one of those tough, square, solid middle-aged men, like a shabbying brown bear, your golden crew-cut greying judiciously at the temples.

#### Translations
### References

* ↑ “shabby, adj.”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford: Oxford University Press, December 2023; “shabby, adj.”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.
* ↑ “shabby, v.”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford: Oxford University Press, July 2023.

### Further reading

* “shabby”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.