makeshift

Made to work or suffice; improvised; substituted.

Adjective

  1. Made to work or suffice; improvised; substituted.
    • They used the ledge and a few branches for a makeshift shelter.
    • Hodgson was able to introduce Arsenal teenager Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain for his debut late on as this makeshift England line-up closed out a victory that was solid for the most part without ever threatening to be...
    • The first US service members to die in the conflict between the US and Iran were killed by a direct Iranian strike on a makeshift operations center at a civilian port in Kuwait on Sunday morning local time, a source...

    Synonyms: jury-rigged

Origin

Deverbal from make shift. First appears c. 1554, in the publications of H. Hilarie.

Forms

more makeshift most makeshift make-shift make shift

Derived

makeshiftness makeshifty

Noun Entry 2

  1. A temporary (usually insubstantial) substitution.
    • And I am not a model clergyman—only a decent makeshift. - 1871, George Eliot [pseudonym; Mary Ann Evans], chapter XVII, in Middlemarch […], volume I, Edinburgh; London: William Blackwood and Sons, →OCLC, book II, page...
    • Hoboism cannot be cured or prevented by makeshifts or by local measures and efforts, although community interest naturally is vital in dealing with a problem that comes home to every community. - 1923, Benjamin C....

Forms

makeshifts make-shift make shift

Noun obsolete

  1. A rogue; a shifty person.
    • Greene the coneycatcher, of this dream the author, / For his dainty devise deserveth the halter. / A rakehell, a makeshift, a scribbling fool; / A famous bayard in city and school: / Now sick as a dog, and ever...

Origin

1560s. From make + shift.

Forms

makeshifts make-shift make shift

Related

make shift