indigent
Language: English
Part of speech: adj
Pronunciation: ipa: /ˈɪndɪd͡ʒənt/
ipa: /ɪnˈd(a)ɪd͡ʒənt/
Forms: form: more indigent
form: most indigent
Etymology: From Middle English indigent, from Old French indigent, from Latin indigēns, present participle of indigeō (“to need”), from indu (“in, within”) + egeō (“to be in need, want”).
Senses: examples: text: Many of the indigent children are so badly provided for by their parents, with both food and raiment, that they cannot attend school regularly; […]
ref: 1830, Thomas Ritchie, Journal of the House of Delegates of the Commonwealth of Virginia, page 422:
text: And were I not a thing for you and me
To execrate in anguish, you would be
As indigent a stranger to surprise,
I fear, as I was once, and as unwise.
ref: 1932, Edwin Arlington Robinson, “Prodigal Son”, in Nicodemus:
text: I had since my introduction to the prince been sensitive to the fact that he must think an obviously indigent soldier of fortune will sooner or later open the subject of a subscription to the Greek Cause.
ref: 1974, Guy Davenport, Tatlin!:
text: Because of this, when my second major health fiasco happened, I had no insurance, so I went to a teaching hospital where they took indigent patients.
ref: 2011, Carla Ulbrich, How Can You Not Laugh at a Time Like This?: Reclaim Your Health With Humor, Creativity, and Grit, Tell Me Press, →ISBN, page 65:
text: In numerous Supreme Court decisions since Gideon v. Wainwright, the states have been required to provide counsel for indigent defendants at virtually all other stages of the criminal process, beginning with arrest and concluding with the defendant's release from the system.
ref: 2013, Larry J. Siegel, John L. Worral, Essentials of Criminal Justice, Wadsworth, →ISBN, page 162:
synonyms: word: almsless
word: arm
word: badly off
word: bankrupt
word: beggared
word: beggarly
word: boracic
word: broke
word: broken
word: broker than the Ten Commandments
word: destitute
word: dirt poor
word: disadvantaged
word: down and out
word: down at heel
word: down on one's luck
word: down on one's uppers
word: empty-handed
word: feeling the pinch
word: flat
word: hard up
word: impecunious
word: impoverished
word: in need
word: indigent
word: insolvent
word: lower-class
word: necessitous
word: needy
word: oofless
word: pauperized
word: penniless
word: penurious
word: pinched
word: pok kai
word: poor
word: poor as a church mouse
word: poor as a rat
word: poor as Job
word: possessionless
word: poverty-ridden
word: poverty-stricken
word: shillingless
word: skint
word: stone-broke
word: stony-broke
word: strapped
word: stuck
word: threadbare
word: unwealthy
word: wealthless
antonyms: affluent
glosses: Poor; destitute; in need.
examples: text: Again some Bodies dissolve both in Fire and Water, as Gums; &c. And these are such, as have both Plenty of Spirit; and their tangible Parts indigent of Moisture: the former promotes the Dilatation of the Spirits by the Fire and the latter stimulates the Parts to receive the Liquor.
ref: 1620, Francis Bacon, Instauratio Magnus, Part III, Section ii, subsection "Liquifaction"
text: Will Providence guard us? How do I ſee that our Sex is naturally Indigent of Protection?—I hope it is in Fate to crown our Loves; for 'tis only in the Protection of Men of Honour, that we are naturally truly Safe […]
ref: 1701, Richard Steele, The Funeral: or, Grief A-la-mode, act II, scene 1:
glosses: Utterly lacking or in need of something specified.
Derived terms: indigently
nonindigent
unindigent
Related terms: indigence
indigency