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parsimonious

UK/pɑː.sɪˈməʊ.ni.əs/US/pɑɹ.sɪˈmoʊ.ni.əs/
adjectiveC2Rare in speech; mostly a word you read · #15,130 of 15,258leans written

Parsimonious means extremely unwilling to spend or to give. Parsimonious with praise.

It is a formal word for mean and is often used about praise rather than money. In science a parsimonious explanation is the simplest one that fits, which is a compliment.

Definitions of parsimonious

  1. 1adjectiveparsimoniousExtremely unwilling to spend or to give.C2

    “The department was parsimonious with everything except paper.”

parsimonious is a quality.

Where it comes from

  1. Proto-Indo-European

    *h₂erk-

  2. Middle English

    parcimonie

  3. English

    parsimony

  4. English, today

    parsimonious

Built from

  • parcimony · Middle English — economy, frugality, thrift
  • parsimōnia · Latin — frugality, thrift, parsimony; moderation, restraint; stinginess
  • parcō · Latin — to economize, save up; etc.
  • *h₂erk- · Proto-Indo-European — to hold; to guard, protect; to lock

From parsimony + -ous. parsimony comes from Middle English parcimonie. From Late Middle English parcimonie, parcimony (“economy, frugality, thrift”), borrowed from Latin parcimōnia, parsimōnia (“frugality, thrift, parsimony; moderation, restraint; stinginess”), from pars- (the of parcō (“to economize, save up; etc.”)) + -mōnia. The further etymology of parcō is uncertain; it is possibly from Proto-Indo-European h₂epó (“away; off”) + h₂erk- (“to hold; to guard, protect; to lock”).

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practise this word

parsimonious in the wild

  • Because the most-parsimonious tree favors the shortest possible evolutionary graph, this means that it will often underestimate the actual evolutionary change that could have occurred.

    Maximum parsimony

  • As with most process algebras, PEPA is a parsimonious language.

    PEPA

  • The term parsimonious with the truth is also sometimes used in the same way.

    Economical with the truth

  • Tonality flux is a special instance of the principle of parsimonious (most direct) voice leading.

    Tonality flux

  • In his late thirties, Bentley became parsimonious and stopped washing and cleaning himself and his shop.

    Dirty Dick

1 / 2

From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.

Related words

the parcō family

parsimonious

parsimonious — used about once every 159,543 pages · #15,130 · point at the bar for the others