threadbare

adj

1. Of cloth, clothing, furnishings, etc.: frayed and worn to an extent that the nap is damaged and the warp and weft threads show; shabby, worn-out.

   “His life vvas nigh vnto deaths dore yplaſte, / And thred-bare cote, and cobled ſhoes hee vvare, […]”

   “VVill any Freedom here from you be born, / VVhoſe Cloaths are thred-bare, and vvhoſe Cloaks are torn?”

   “We are told, that an ancient tragic poet, to move the pity of his audience for his exiled kings and distressed heroes, used to make the actors represent them in dresses and clothes that were thread-bare and decayed.”

   “No one stops to question the coin of a rich man; but a poor devil cannot pass off either a joke or a guinea, without its being examined on both sides. Wit and coin are always doubted with a threadbare coat.”

   “Ah! You may look through that shirt till your eyes ache; but you won't find a hole in it, nor a thread-bare place. It's the best he had, and a fine one too.”

2. (figuratively)In poor condition; damaged, shabby; also, poorly equipped or provided for, inadequate, meagre, scanty.

   “Welth and wyt, I say, be so threde bare worne, / That all is without measure, and fer beyonde the mone.”

   “From an Underſtanding and a Conſcience, thread-bare and ragged vvith perpetual turning; […]”

   “Holy Virgin stood in the main Convent of Glatz, in rather a threadbare condition, when the Prussians first approached; the Jesuits, and ardently Orthodox of both sexes, flagitating Heaven and her with their prayers, that she would vouchsafe to keep the Prussians out.”

3. (figuratively)Of an argument, excuse, etc.: used so often that it is no longer effective or interesting; banal, clichéd, trite.
4. (figuratively)An argument or assertion with little in the way of substance or supporting evidence.

   “But with so many tired, lazy callbacks to its own threadbare catalog (including “Love Is Not The Answer,” a watery echo of the epic “I Believe In A Thing Called Love” from 2003’s Permission To Land), Hot Cakes marks the point where The Darkness has stopped cannibalizing the golden age of stadium rock and simply started cannibalizing itself.”

5. (archaic, obsolete)Of a person: wearing clothes of threadbare (sense 1) material; hence, impoverished, poor.

   “Be gon, all Honeſty, / Thou fooliſh, ſlender, thredbare, ſtarving thing, be gon!”