scarce
pronunciation
How to pronounce scarce in British English:
UK [skeəs]
How to pronounce scarce in American English:
US [skers]
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- Adjective:
- not enough; hard to find
- deficient in quantity or number compared with the demand
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- Adverb:
- by a small margin
Word Origin
- scarce
- scarce: [13] Scarce comes via Anglo-Norman scars, earlier escars, from Vulgar Latin *excarpsus ‘picked out’, hence ‘rare’. This was the past participle of *excarpere, an alteration of classical Latin excerpere ‘picked out. select’ (source of English excerpt [17]). And excerpere was a compound verb formed from the prefix ex- ‘out’ and carpere ‘pluck’ (source of English carpet and related to harvest).=> carpet, excerpt, harvest
- scarce (adj.)
- c. 1300, "restricted in quantity," from Old North French scars "scanty, scarce" (Old French eschars, Modern French échars) from Vulgar Latin *scarsus, from *escarpsus, from *excarpere "pluck out," from classical Latin excerpere "pluck out" (see excerpt). As an adverb early 14c. from the adjective. Phrase to make oneself scarce "go away" first attested 1771, noted as a current "cant phrase." Related: Scarcely.
Antonym
Example
- 1. Posters commemorating mao 's death are scarce .
- 2. Overall , investment in western china is still scarce and scattered .
- 3. Gold is prized because it is both beautiful and scarce .
- 4. Government spending merely directs scarce factors of production away from their most productive uses .
- 5. What has become relatively scarce over the past few years is affluent men .