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The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 (gcide)

Poverty \Pov"er*ty\ (p[o^]v"[~e]r*t[y^]), n. [OE. poverte, OF.
povert['e], F. pauvret['e], fr. L. paupertas, fr. pauper
poor. See {Poor}.]
1. The quality or state of being poor or indigent; want or
scarcity of means of subsistence; indigence; need.
"Swathed in numblest poverty." --Keble.
[1913 Webster]

The drunkard and the glutton shall come to poverty.
--Prov. xxiii.
21.
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2. Any deficiency of elements or resources that are needed or
desired, or that constitute richness; as, poverty of soil;
poverty of the blood; poverty of ideas.
[1913 Webster]

{Poverty grass} (Bot.), a name given to several slender
grasses (as {Aristida dichotoma}, and {Danthonia spicata})
which often spring up on old and worn-out fields.
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Syn: Indigence; penury; beggary; need; lack; want;
scantiness; sparingness; meagerness; jejuneness.

Usage: {Poverty}, {Indigence}, {Pauperism}. Poverty is a
relative term; what is poverty to a monarch, would be
competence for a day laborer. Indigence implies
extreme distress, and almost absolute destitution.
Pauperism denotes entire dependence upon public
charity, and, therefore, often a hopeless and degraded
state.
[1913 Webster] Powan