miser, n. niggard, skinflint, SI. skin, SI. cheapskate, Inf. piker, muckworm, SI. screw; penny pinch-er, pinchpenny, lickpenny, Inf. tightwad; cheeseparer, hoarder, save-all, Scot. carl; scrooge, Harpagon, money-grubber, harpy; curmudgeon, churl, hunks, miserable, adj. 1. forlorn, woeful or woful, woebegone, Archaic, woesome, Obs. baleful, heartsick, downhearted, broken-hearted, heartbroken, crushed, broken, desolate, despairing; worried, anxious, afflicted, stricken, heavy-laden; down, disconsolate, dejected, depressed, despondent, melancholic, gloomy, dismal, dreary, Literary, drear, lugubrious, funereal; somber, glum, low-spirited, disheartened, discouraged, Inf. broken-up, Inf. cut-up, SI. bummed-out or bummed; sad, unhappy, infelicitous, sorrowful, doleful, dolorous, dolorific, grieved, mournful, lachrymose, lachrymal, lachrymatory, comfortless, joyless, cheerless, inconsolable.
2. destitute, indigent, poverty-stricken, abject, needy, in need, wanting, lacking, in want, beggared, beggarly; poor, underprivileged, disadvantaged, deprived, bereft, ill-off, badly or poorly off, Inf. hard-up; impoverished, pauperized, ruined, failed, down and out, down at the heels, out at the elbows, SI. busted, SI. broke.
3. contemptible, beneath contempt, worthy of contempt, despicable, detestable, base, base-spirited, mean, mean-spirited, low, vile, paltry, Archaic. caitiff.
4. wretched, sorry, pitiful, pitiable, piteous, Inf. lousy, SI. rotten; adverse, difficult, troublesome, hard, trying; star-crossed, ill-starred, evil-starred, unlucky, luckless, unfortunate, hapless; tragic, ruinous, fatal, dire, black, grievous, joyless, grim, stark, bleak; abject, sordid, slummy, slum-like.
5. pitiful, pathetic, pathetical; sad, distressing, plaintive; lamentable, regrettable, deplorable, rueful; touching, moving, affecting, affective, affectional, melting, heartrending, heart-moving, heart-breaking. miserliness, n. 1. stinginess, niggardliness, parsimony, penuriousness, churlishness, nearness; meanness, selfishness, tightness, tight-fistedness, closefist-edness, cheapness, SI. chintziness; graspingness, avidity, avarice, avariciousness, greed, cupidity, rapacity, rapaciousness, covetousness; mercenariness, venality, usuriousness, sordidness.
2. scrimpiness, shabbiness, grudgingness, begrudg-ingness, reluctance or unwillingness to give; thrift, thriftiness, frugality, spareness, chariness, economy, miserly, adj. 1. stingy, niggardly, Rare, illiberal, parsimonious, carking, skinflinty; penurious, mean, tight, tight-fisted, closefisted, cheap, SI. chintzy; mon-eygrubbing, grasping, avaricious, greedy, rapacious, covetous; self-seeking, mercenary, venal, usurious, churlish, sordid.
2. scrimping, cheeseparing, penny-pinching, grudging, begrudging, ungenerous, stinting, reluctant or unwilling to give; thrifty, frugal, sparing, chary; economical, prudent, saving, penny-wise, misery, n. 1. trial, tribulation, trial and tribulation, test, ordeal; load, burden, heavy load or burden; trouble, adversity, misfortune, affliction, suffering, distress, oppression, mortification; blow, shock, stab, pain, throe.
2. destitution, indigence, poverty, penury, privation, need, want; mendicancy, beggary.
3. woe, wretchedness, grief, heartgrief, heartfelt grief, anguish, agony of mind or spirit, bitterness, Archaic. bale; sorrow, sadness, infelicity, unhappiness, dolor, heartache, aching heart, heartbreak, broken heart, broken-heartedness, heartsickness, heartsore-ness, bleeding heart, heavy heart; desolation, bereavement, prostration, extremity, depths of misery; despair, disconsolateness, despondency, depression, gloom, melancholy, melancholia; anxiety, angst, worry, fret, solicitude, concern, carking, care; agony, torture, torment, pain.