Word.ws English Dictionary

measliest

measliest is the superlative form of measly.

Meaning of measly

Adjective

measly (comparative measlier, superlative measliest)

  1. Particularly of pigs or pork: infected with larval tapeworms or trichinae (parasitic roundworms).
    • Then take five or six apples, pick out the cores and fill up the holes thus made with flour of brimstone; stop up the holes and cast in the apples to the measly hog.1847, William Youatt, The Pig: A Treatise on the Breeds, Management, Feeding, and Medical Treatment, of Swine; with Directions for Salting Pork, and Curing Bacon and Hams, page 113
  2. Of a person: infected with measles.
    • A measly boy, he looked like a tramp, probably one of the street boys from the village, just walked up here and made himself at home, and when I told him to leave, he wouldn't.1902, The Epworth Herald
  3. (figuratively, informal) Small (especially contemptibly small) in amount.
    • For one whole day's work all I was given was twenty measly pounds.

Questions about measliest

What is measliest the superlative form of?
Measliest is the superlative form of measly.

Words near measliest in the dictionary

  1. measles parties
  2. measles party
  3. measleslike
  4. measley
  5. measlier
  6. measliest
  7. measliness
  8. measling
  9. measlings
  10. measly
  11. Measom

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: measliest (page history and authors); measly (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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Cite this entry: “measliest.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/measliest. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.