Word.ws English Dictionary

at rack and manger

at rack and manger adverb: plentifully and at another's expense.

Adverb

at rack and manger (not comparable)

  1. (archaic, idiomatic) plentifully and at another's expense.
    • At that Time, his Lordship took his Brother into his Family, and a Coach and Servants aſſign'd him out of his Equipages; and all at Rack and Manger, requiring only 200 l. a Year1742, Roger North, The Life of the Right Honourable Francis North […]
    • tearing out the bowels of St. Edmundsbury Convent (its larders namely and cellars) in the most ruinous way, by living at rack and manger there.1843 April, Thomas Carlyle, Past and Present, American edition, Boston, Mass.: Charles C[offin] Little and James Brown, published 1843, →OCLC, (please specify |book=I or IV, or the page)

Questions about at rack and manger

What does at rack and manger mean?
At rack and manger means plentifully and at another's expense.
What part of speech is at rack and manger?
At rack and manger is an adverb.

Words near at rack and manger in the dictionary

  1. at peace with
  2. at places
  3. at play
  4. at pleasure
  5. at present
  6. at rack and manger
  7. at random
  8. at rest
  9. at right angles to
  10. at risk
  11. at rovers

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: at rack and manger (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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