beggary

noun

1. (countable, uncountable)The state of a beggar; indigence, extreme poverty.

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

   “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.”

   “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 […]”

   “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.”

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

2. (countable, uncountable)The fact or action of begging.

   “[…] 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.”

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

3. (countable, uncountable)Beggarly 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.”

adj

1. (obsolete)beggarly

   “beggary counterfeits”

   “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.”