Leavings are the scraps and unwanted bits remaining once everything worth having has been taken. Feed on the leavings, the leavings of the meal, nothing but leavings.
The word is always plural and always slightly contemptuous — being given the leavings means being given what nobody else wanted. It is old-fashioned and mostly literary. Note leftovers, which is the neutral modern word and carries none of the insult.
1nounleavingsThe scraps remaining once everything worth having is taken.
“The stray dogs waited behind the restaurant for the leavings from the kitchen.”
leavings is remnants.
Leavings is the plural of a noun from leave, from Old English laefan, to leave behind.
Participial form of "leave".
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA
Practised in A Song of Ice and Fire