penniless
English · Thesaurus
AI In plain words
Writing a short explanation…
Written by a house AI from the entry below, in your language. The entry itself is the source.
penniless
- /ˈpɛ.nɪ.ləs/
Where it comes from
From Middle English penyles, penylees; equivalent to penny + -less. Compare Old Norse penningalauss (“penniless”).
adjective pennyless
-
Lacking even the smallest amount of money.
In societies without national insurance of any kind, almshouses are the last refuge of penniless people.
Similar: farthingless, moneyless, destitute, nillionaire, almsless, arm, badly off, bankrupt, beggared, beggarly, boracic, broke
- Of a country's system of money, abstaining from the use of penny coins, despite having fully decimalized currency, by means of rounding of cash transactions (but not necessarily of cashless ones). Canada became a penniless country in 2013 simply by rounding its cash transactions to the nearest nickel but otherwise not changing anything.
Translations
Every language
adj utterly without money
| Español | miserable |
|---|---|
| 한국어 | 무일푼인 mu'ilpun-in |
| 日本語 | 一文無し ichimonnashi, 無一文 muichimon, 文無し monnashi |
| 中文 | 一貧如洗 /一贫如洗 yīpínrúxǐ, 身無分文 /身无分文 shēnwúfēnwén, 囊空如洗 nángkōngrúxǐ, 不名一文 bùmíngyīwén, 一文不名 yīwénbùmíng |
| हिन्दी | निकौड़िया nikauṛiyā |
| Português | paupérrimo |
| Français | sans le sou |
| Deutsch | mittellos, ohne Geld, ohne einen Pfennig |
| Italiano | spiantato, squattrinato, scannato |
| Ελληνικά | απένταρος apéntaros |
| Русский | безде́нежный bezdénežnyj, без гроша́ bez grošá, без копе́йки bez kopéjki, на мели́ na melí |
| العربية | فقير |
Talk about this word "penniless." Wiktionary, via Micwyn, micwyn.com/word/penniless. Accessed 6 Nov. 2026. penniless. (n.d.). In Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Retrieved November 6, 2026, from https://micwyn.com/word/penniless "penniless." Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Accessed November 6, 2026. https://micwyn.com/word/penniless.Cite this
@misc{penniless_2026,
title = {penniless},
howpublished = {Wiktionary, via Micwyn},
year = {2026},
url = {https://micwyn.com/word/penniless},
urldate = {2026-11-06}
}
