Word.ws English Dictionary

lucre

Syllables: lu·cre/ˈluːkə/US/ˈluːkɚ/

lucre noun: money, riches, or wealth, especially when seen as having a corrupting effect or causing greed, or obtained in an underhanded manner.

Noun

lucre (uncountable)

  1. Money, riches, or wealth, especially when seen as having a corrupting effect or causing greed, or obtained in an underhanded manner.
    • A Biſhop then muſt be blameleſſe, the huſband of one wife, vigilant, sober, of good behauiour, giuen to hoſpitalitie, apt to teach; / Not giuen to wine, no ſtriker, not greedy of filthy lucre, but patient, not a brawler, not couetous; […]1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, 1 Timothy 3:2–3
    • By-ends and Silver-Demas both agree; / One calls, the other runs, that he may be / A ſharer in his lucre; ſo theſe two / Take up in this World, and no further go.1678, John Bunyan, The Pilgrim’s Progress from This World, to That which is to Come: […], London: […] Nath[aniel] Ponder […], →OCLC, page 145
    Synonyms:
    mammon

lucre meaning in Tamil, Urdu, Malayalam and Kannada

lucre in Tamil

பண ஆதாயம், வருமானம், பலன், இலாபம்

lucre in Urdu

دولت, غنا, مال, ثروت, زر

lucre in Malayalam

wealth, money, cash
ആദായം, ദ്രവ്യലാഭം, ലാഭം, ധനലാഭം, ധനാഗമം, ആയം

lucre in Kannada

ಪಡಪು, ಲಾಭ ಹಣ, ಕೆಟ್ಟ ಸಂಪಾದನೆ, ದುರ್ಲಾಭ

Synonyms of lucre

Origin of lucre

From Middle English lūcre, lucor, lucour, lucur (“gain in money, profit; money; wages; illicit gain; advantage, benefit”), from Old French lucre or Latin lucrum (“advantage, profit; love of gain, avarice”), from Proto-Indo-European *leh₂w- (“gain, profit”) + *-tlom (variant of *-trom (suffix forming nouns denoting tools or instruments)).

Words formed from lucre

Words that rhyme with lucre

Questions about lucre

What does lucre mean?
Lucre means money, riches, or wealth, especially when seen as having a corrupting effect or causing greed, or obtained in an underhanded manner.
What is lucre in Tamil?
Lucre in Tamil is பண ஆதாயம், வருமானம், பலன். See Lucre meaning in Tamil.
What part of speech is lucre?
Lucre is a noun.
How do you pronounce lucre?
Lucre is pronounced /ˈluːkə/ (UK).

Words near lucre in the dictionary

  1. Lucraft
  2. lucrative
  3. lucratively
  4. lucrativeness
  5. lucrativity
  6. lucre
  7. Lucret
  8. Lucretia
  9. Lucretian
  10. Lucretius
  11. lucriferous

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: lucre (page history and authors); lucre (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); lucre (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); lucre (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license); lucre (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: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-lucre.wav.

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