threadbare
Of cloth, clothing, furnishings, etc.: frayed and worn to an extent that the nap is damaged and the warp and weft threads show; shabby, worn-out.
Adjective
- Of cloth, clothing, furnishings, etc.: frayed and worn to an extent that the nap is damaged and the warp and weft threads show; shabby, worn-out.
- His life vvas nigh vnto deaths dore yplaſte, / And thred-bare cote, and cobled ſhoes hee vvare, […] - 1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book I, Canto IIII”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William...
- VVill any Freedom here from you be born, / VVhoſe Cloaths are thred-bare, and vvhoſe Cloaks are torn? - 1693, Decimus Junius Juvenalis, W. Bowles, transl., “[The Satires of Decimus Junius Juvenalis.] The Fifth Satyr”,...
- We are told, that an ancient tragic poet, to move the pity of his audience for his exiled kings and distressed heroes, used to make the actors represent them in dresses and clothes that were thread-bare and decayed. -...
- In poor condition; damaged, shabby; also, poorly equipped or provided for, inadequate, meagre, scanty.
- Welth and wyt, I say, be so threde bare worne, / That all is without measure, and fer beyonde the mone. - a. 1530 (date written), John Skelton, “Magnyfycence, a Goodly Interlude and a Mery, […]”, in Alexander Dyce,...
- From an Underſtanding and a Conſcience, thread-bare and ragged vvith perpetual turning; […] - 1704, [Jonathan Swift], “Section I. The Introduction.”, in A Tale of a Tub. […], London: […] John Nutt, […], →OCLC, page 51:
- Holy Virgin stood in the main Convent of Glatz, in rather a threadbare condition, when the Prussians first approached; the Jesuits, and ardently Orthodox of both sexes, flagitating Heaven and her with their prayers,...
Synonyms: awanting deficient dismal exiguous geason inadequate insufficient lank lean lousy meager measly paltry poor raunchy scant scantling scanty scarce skimpy sleazy slender spare sparse
- Of an argument, excuse, etc.: used so often that it is no longer effective or interesting; banal, clichéd, trite.
Synonyms: banal bathetic bromidic cheesy clichéd commonplace corny dog-eared hackneyed hoary overdone overused overworked pat played out shopworn stale threadbare timeworn tired trite warmed-over well-worn
Antonyms: fresh new all-new brand new brand spanking new cherry freshly made green hot mint nascent newish new-laid novel pristine red-hot unused verdurous virgin virginal youthful
- An argument or assertion with little in the way of substance or supporting evidence.
- But with so many tired, lazy callbacks to its own threadbare catalog (including “Love Is Not The Answer,” a watery echo of the epic “I Believe In A Thing Called Love” from 2003’s Permission To Land), Hot Cakes marks the...
Synonyms: awanting deficient dismal exiguous geason inadequate insufficient lank lean lousy meager measly paltry poor raunchy scant scantling scanty scarce skimpy sleazy slender spare sparse
- Of a person: wearing clothes of threadbare (sense 1) material; hence, impoverished, poor.
- Be gon, all Honeſty, / Thou fooliſh, ſlender, thredbare, ſtarving thing, be gon! - 1678 February 28 (date licensed), Tho[mas] Shadwell, The History of Timon of Athens, the Man-hater. […], London: […] J[ohn] M[acock] for...
Synonyms: broke down at heel penniless almsless arm badly off bankrupt beggared beggarly boracic broken broker than the Ten Commandments depauperate destitute dirt poor disadvantaged down and out down on one's luck down on one's uppers empty-handed farthingless feeling the pinch flat goodless
Antonyms: bow-legged wi' brass comfortably off filthy rich loaded minted moneyed moneybags of means oofy rich rich as Croesus rolling rolling in dough rolling in it upper crust wealthy well-endowed well-heeled well off well-to-do
Origin
PIE word *bʰosós From Middle English thred-bar, thred-bare (“of cloth, clothing, etc.: worn to such an extent that the warp and weft threads show, shabby, worn-out; (figurative) inadequate, poor”) [and other forms], from thred (“piece of textile twine”) (from Old English þrǣd (“thread”), from Proto-Germanic *þrēduz (“thread; twisted fibre”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *terh₁- (“to drill, pierce; to rub; to turn, twist”)) + bar, bare (“naked, unclothed, bare; not covered”) (from Old English bær (“naked, bare; unconcealed”), ultimately from Proto-Germanic *bazaz (“naked, bare”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰosós (“bare; barefoot”)). The English word is analysable as thread + bare.