exiguous
- adjective
- /ɪɡˈzɪɡjuəs/
- Formal
:
exiguo
- The number of Spanish and Portuguese -udo participles in the twelfth century and the early decades of the thirteenth is quite small, even when we take into account the exiguous quantity of preserved texts.
Examples
-
The scholarship offered an exiguous amount of funding, barely covering tuition costs.
-
He claims that this Frankenstein's monster of his will soon devour all current magazines, rendering their printed forms exiguous.
Fiction book (2001) -
Colette was wearing that exiguous nurse uniform he liked so much.
Fiction book (1998) -
And most of its industrial firms will struggle to realize exiguous margins at the lower reaches of global industrial production chains.
Academic text (2004) -
They may serve as models, although they are built in the most exiguous spaces (Beaudoin 1984:194).
Academic text (1993) -
The cast opened wide its collective arms, so to speak, and the threatened socializing began, surging around a folding picnic table with a rather exiguous supply of crackers, cheese, and soft drinks in plastic champagne glasses.
Fiction book (1991) -
After hours of searching, they found only an exiguous supply of food in the pantry.
-
His exiguous knowledge of the subject made it difficult for him to contribute to the discussion.
Synonyms
∞
1.0
Not large in size or amount
∞
1.0
So small it can fit in your hand
87
2.0
Small in amount or number, not large
52
4.8
So small that only a microscope can see it
48
4.8
Too small in amount or quality to be enough
37
4.4
Very small in size or amount
29
6.3
Too small to be useful
20
6.8
Very small in size
10
2.0
A little smaller than usual
2
6.6
A small amount or number that is barely enough
1
4.3
Very small and easy to miss
Antonyms
How Little
Surface Forms
Morphology
exiguous = exigu + ous
The adjective is formed from a Latin combining stem 'exigu-' plus the productive English suffix '-ous', but the stem is not a recognisable standalone English base for typical learners, so the meaning cannot be reliably derived from familiar components.
Etymology
Exiguous comes from an old Latin idea meaning 'small' or 'scant'. A helpful way to remember it is to see ex- as 'out' and think of exit, as if most has gone 'out' and only a little is left. So, exiguous describes something that is very small in amount.