avarice
pronunciation
How to pronounce avarice in British English:
UK [ˈævərɪs]
How to pronounce avarice in American English:
US [ˈævərɪs]
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- Noun:
- reprehensible acquisitiveness; insatiable desire for wealth (personified as one of the deadly sins)
- extreme greed for material wealth
Word Origin
- avarice
- avarice: [13] The Latin verb avēre meant ‘covet’. One of its derivatives was the adjective avārus ‘greedy’, from which the noun avāritia was formed. This entered English via Old French avarice. Another of its derivatives was the adjective avidus ‘greedy’ which, as well as being the source of English avid [18], produced, via a hypothetical contracted form *audus, the adjective audax ‘bold’, source of English audacity [15].=> audacity, avid
- avarice (n.)
- c. 1300, from Old French avarice "greed, covetousness" (12c.), from Latin avaritia "greed," from avarus "greedy," adjectival form of avere "crave, long for."
Example
- 1. A prize beyond the dreams of avarice
- 2. Cynics say that mps have made the speaker the fall guy for their own avarice .
- 3. Some men steal out of need or avarice ; others kill themselves out of despair , or murder for revenge or gain .
- 4. An exception is northern france but , particularly in the south west of the country a ready supply of goose fat no doubt helped palliate local rage at the edicts and avarice of the church .
- 5. George washington called gambling " the child of avarice , the brother of iniquity and the father of mischief " , but benjamin franklin organised a lottery in philadelphia in 1746 .