Word.ws English Dictionary

depauperate

/dɪˈpɔːpəɹət/

depauperate adjective: having stunted growth.

Adjective

depauperate (comparative more depauperate, superlative most depauperate)

  1. (usually) Having stunted growth
  2. (obsolete) Impoverished.
  3. Having a limited biodiversity.
    • "...because of Kamchatka's isolation from mainland river systems, its streams are relatively depauperate of other fresh water fish, leaving Oncorhynchus species to face few competitors and predators."2009, David Quammen, Where the Salmon Rule, National Geographic (August 2009), page 35
  4. Displaying only a limited range of logically possible morphosyntactic combinations.
    • "The morphological profile of Sko languages varies widely, from the nearly isolating structure of Dumo, with simply subject prefixation for verbs, and that depauperate, to the rich polysynthesis of Barupu."2018, William Foley, The languages of the Sepik-Ramu Basin and Environs, in The Languages and Linguistics of the New Guinea Area, page 405

Verb

IPA/dɪˈpɔːpəɹeɪt/

depauperate (third-person singular simple present depauperates, present participle depauperating, simple past and past participle depauperated)

  1. (obsolete) To impoverish.
    • Liming […] does not so much depauperate; the ground will last long, and beareth larger grain.1707, J[ohn] Mortimer, The Whole Art of Husbandry; or, The Way of Managing and Improving of Land. […], London: […] J[ohn] H[umphreys] for H[enry] Mortlock […], and J[onathan] Robinson […], →OCLC
    • Humility of mind which depauperates the spirit.1678, Antiquitates Christianæ: Or, the History of the Life and Death of the Holy Jesus: […], London: […] E. Flesher, and R. Norton, for R[ichard] Royston, […], →OCLC
  2. To stunt the growth of.

Synonyms of depauperate

2 more synonymsFewer synonyms

All synonyms of depauperate

Forms of depauperate

Adjective
comparativemore depauperate
superlativemost depauperate
Verb
third-person singular presentdepauperates
present participledepauperating
past participledepauperated
pastdepauperated

Origin of depauperate

From Middle English depauperat (“impoverished”), from Medieval Latin depauperātus (“impoverished”), past participle of depauperō (“to impoverish”), itself from Latin de- + pauperō (“to impoverish”), from pauper (“poor”). Equivalent to de- + pauper + -ate (adjective-forming suffix). Cognate with Italian depauperare, Spanish depauperar.

From the above adjective; see -ate for more. Equivalent to de- + pauper + -ate (verb-forming suffix).

Questions about depauperate

What does depauperate mean?
Depauperate means having stunted growth.
What part of speech is depauperate?
Depauperate can be an adjective or a verb.
How do you pronounce depauperate?
Depauperate is pronounced /dɪˈpɔːpəɹət/.

Words near depauperate in the dictionary

  1. depatterned
  2. depatterning
  3. depatterns
  4. DePaul
  5. DePaulo
  6. depauperate
  7. depauperated
  8. depauperates
  9. depauperating
  10. depauperation
  11. depauperisation

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: depauperate (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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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-depauperate-adj.wav.

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