Word.ws English Dictionary

chary

Syllables: cha·ry/ˈt͡ʃɛɹi//ˈt͡ʃɛəɹi/

chary adjective: careful, cautious, shy, wary.

Adjective

chary (comparative charier, superlative chariest)

  1. Careful, cautious, shy, wary.
    • The Charieſt maide is prodigall enough, / If ſhe vnmaske hir beautie to the Moone.c. 1599–1602 (date written), William Shake-speare, The Tragicall Historie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke: […] (First Quarto), London: […] [Valentine Simmes] for N[icholas] L[ing] and Iohn Trundell...
    • [E]ls is he chary and wary to lay himſelfe open to any daunger, if the finall end of his endeauour and toile bee not plauſible in his demurring judgement.1607, T[homas] W[alkington], “Of a Sanguine Temperature”, in The Optick Glasse of Hvmors. Or The Touchstone of a Golden Temperature, or the Philosophers Stone to Make a Golden Temper, […], London...
  2. Excessively particular or fussy about details; fastidious.
    • True, the wreath might have been improved with a little more care; [...] Though, after all, we are, perhaps, too chary; for in nature every leaf is not ironed out to a form, nor propped up with a wiry precision; but blown and ruffled by the refreshing breezes, and looking as easy, and careless, and...1839 March 9, [Edgar Allan Poe], “A Wreath of Wild Flowers from New England. By Frances Sargent Osgood. 12mo. pp. 364. London, 1839. Churton. [book review]”, in The Literary Gazette; and Journal of...
    Antonyms:
    unchary
  3. Not disposed to give freely; not lavish; frugal, sparing.
    • Oh! look not thus o'erjoy'd, for if I thought / We e'er could meet again this side the grave, / Trust me, I had been charier of my tenderness.1820, H[enry] H[art] Milman, “Fountain of Siloe—Night—An Approaching Storm”, in The Fall of Jerusalem: A Dramatic Poem, London: John Murray, […], →OCLC, page 97
    • The house had a projecting window, where the poet [Percy Bysshe Shelley] loved to sit with book in hand, and catch, according to his custom, the maximum of sunlight granted by a chary English summer.1895, John Addington Symonds, “[Shelley] Second Residence in London, and Separation from Harriet”, in James [Augustus] Cotter Morison, [Thomas Henry] Huxley, John A. Symonds, Gibbon […] Also Hume […]...
    Antonyms:
    unchary
  4. (obsolete) Cared for, regarded as precious; cherished.
    • The bounty so much delighted mine host, that he ran to fill the stirrup-cup (for which no charge was ever made) from a butt yet charier than that which he had pierced for the former stoup.1820 March, [Walter Scott], chapter IV, in The Monastery. A Romance. […], volume III, Edinburgh: […] Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, […]; and for Archibald Constable and Co., and John...
    Antonyms:
    unchary

Adverb

chary (comparative more chary, superlative most chary)

  1. Synonym of charily: carefully, cautiously, warily.
    • O therefore loue be of thy ſelfe ſo wary, / As I not for my ſelfe, but for thee will, / Bearing thy heart, which I will keep ſo chary / As tender nurſe her babe from faring ill, [...]1609, William Shakespeare, “Sonnet 22”, in Shake-speares Sonnets. […], London: By G[eorge] Eld for T[homas] T[horpe] and are to be sold by William Aspley, →OCLC, lines 11–12

chary meaning in Bengali, Malayalam and Kannada

chary in Bengali

সতর্ক, সংকুচিত, মিতব্যয়ী

chary in Malayalam

കരുതലുള്ള, സൂക്ഷ്മതയുള്ള, ജാഗ്രതയുള്ള, ശ്രദ്ധയുള്ള

chary in Kannada

ಹಿಡಿತದ, ಧೈರ್ಯಸಾಲದ, ಜಾಗರೂಕತೆಯ, ಎಚ್ಚರಿಕೆಯ, ಹುಷಾರಿನ

Examples of chary in a sentence

  • [Y]our Women of Honour, as you call 'em, are only chary of their reputations, not their Perſons, and 'tis ſcandal they wou'd avoid, not Men: [...]1675, [William] Wycherley, The Country-wife, a Comedy, […], London: Printed for Thomas Dring, […], →OCLC; republished London: Printed for...
  • Of ſpotleſs fame, be chary as your lives! / Keep wide of proof, and you're the beſt of wives!1775, Colly Cibber [i.e., Colley Cibber], “Epilogue”, in Henry Fielding, The Modern Husband. A Comedy. […] (The Works of Henry Fielding...
  • When Lord Berek speaks with you and your companions alone, as he must, be chary in your replies.2007, Stephen R[eeder] Donaldson, Fatal Revenant (The Last Chronicles of Thomas Covenant; 2), New York, N.Y.: G[eorge] P[almer] Putnam’s...
  • We instinctively know that nature supplied the form but, ever chary of favors, has passed on to give the beautiful fare perhaps, to a woman of unlovely form.1910 March 19, “For the care of the face”, in Spokane Daily Chronicle, Spokane, Wash.: Chronicle Pub. Co., →OCLC:

Synonyms of chary

27 more synonymsFewer synonyms

Antonyms

10 more antonymsFewer antonyms

All synonyms and antonyms of chary

Forms of chary

Adjective
comparativecharier
superlativechariest
Adverb
comparativemore chary
superlativemost chary

Origin of chary

From Middle English chari, charre, charri, chary, Early Middle English cearig, chariȝ (“concerned with, diligent; sad, sorrowful; of a person: cherished, loved”), from Old English ċeariġ (“careful; pensive; chary, wary; anxious, sad, sorrowful; dire, grievous”), from Proto-West Germanic *karag (“anxious; sad”), from Proto-Germanic *karō + *-gaz, ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *ǵeh₂r- (“exclamation; voice”) + *-kos (suffix forming adjectives with the meaning ‘pertaining to; typical of’)); analysable as care + -y. The English word is cognate with Danish karrig (“miserly, stingy”), Dutch karig (“austere, scant, sparing”), Norwegian karrig (“barren; meagre; poor”), Old High German charag, karag (“sparing”) (modern German karg (“barren; meagre, poor”)), Old Saxon carag, karag, Swedish karg (“austere; barren; hungry; needy, poor”). See further at care.

Words formed from chary

Words that rhyme with chary

19 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about chary

What does chary mean?
Chary means careful, cautious, shy, wary.
What is chary in Bengali?
Chary in Bengali is সতর্ক, সংকুচিত, মিতব্যয়ী. See Chary meaning in Bengali.
How do you use chary in a sentence?
[Y]our Women of Honour, as you call 'em, are only chary of their reputations, not their Perſons, and 'tis ſcandal they wou'd avoid, not Men: [...]
What part of speech is chary?
Chary can be an adjective or an adverb.
How do you pronounce chary?
Chary is pronounced /ˈt͡ʃɛəɹi/ (UK).

Words near chary in the dictionary

  1. Charwat
  2. Charwelton
  3. charwoman
  4. charwomanly
  5. charwomen
  6. chary
  7. Charybdian
  8. Charybdis
  9. charybdotoxin
  10. charybdotoxins
  11. Charyn

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: chary (page history and authors); chary (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); chary (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); chary (Kannada Wiktionary) (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.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-uk-chary.oga.

Cite this entry: “chary.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/chary. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.