measly

Etymology

It is formed from English measle + -y,^[2][3] measle being the singular of measles;^[2] Barnhart and Merriam-Webster give the base as measles itself.^[4][5] The Middle English word for "infected with measles" was maseled.^[3] The noun measles goes back to Middle English masel (“little spot”), perhaps from Middle Dutch masel (“blemish”) or Middle Low German masele, both from Proto-Germanic *mas- (“spot, blemish”).^[3][2]

Earliest recorded meaning

Of a pig or pork, infected with cysticercosis, the tapeworm disease called measles in swine: 1598, in Florio's Italian–English dictionary A Worlde of Wordes.^[2][5] Barnhart and Etymonline give 1687 and the 1680s for "affected with measles".^[4][3]

Semantic evolution

The adjective began with diseased pigs and their meat, and was applied to people with measles only from 1863.^[2][6] Johnson (1755) defined it as "scabbed with the measles", quoting Swift on a sow scratching its measly rump.^[7] The American Heritage Dictionary explains the later sense from the poor quality and unhealthiness of measly pork:^[8] from 1847 the word meant inferior, contemptible or of little value, and of people mean or stingy.^[2] Barnhart and Etymonline date this sense to 1864 and place it in British slang.^[4][3] In the dialects of Scotland and Yorkshire measly also meant spotted or blotchy, and in Warwickshire and Middlesex poor or small, as in a measly lot of heifers.^[9] Today the sense "meagre, contemptibly small" is the usual one.^[10][5]

Timeline

• 1598 – of pigs or pork, infected with measles (cysticercosis).^[2][5]
• 1696 – of or resembling measles (now rare).^[2]
• 1847 – inferior, contemptible, paltry; of a person, stingy.^[2]
• 1849 – blotchy, spotted.^[2]
• 1863 – of a person, having measles.^[2]

Meanings

Adjective

1. (informal) Contemptibly small or meagre: They paid him a measly ten pounds for the job.^[5][10][2]
2. Infected with measles.^[5][10][2]
3. Of meat or an animal, infested with larval tapeworms; measled.^[5][10][2]
4. Blotchy or spotted.^[2][11]

Related words

• measles
• measled

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c Barnhart, Robert K., ed. (1995), The Barnhart Concise Dictionary of Etymology, New York: HarperCollins
5. ^ a b c d e f g Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
6. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
8. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
9. ^ Wright, Joseph, ed. (1898–1905), The English Dialect Dictionary, 6 vols., Oxford: Henry Frowde; via EDD Online 4.0, University of Innsbruck (CC BY 4.0)
10. ^ a b c d Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
11. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press