# misery

Pronunciation: say "MIZ-uh-ree" US /ˈmɪz(ə)ɹi/, UK /ˈmɪz(ə)ɹɪ/

## Noun

1. Great unhappiness, or extreme pain of body or mind; deep distress or wretchedness.
   - Simple: A feeling of great unhappiness or suffering in the body or mind.
   - _The famine brought untold misery to thousands of families._
   - _She hid her misery behind a calm and polite smile._
2. A cause of unhappiness; a calamity or misfortune that brings suffering.
   - Simple: Something that causes great suffering or trouble.
   - _The war was the greatest misery the region had ever endured._
   - _Each new misery seemed to pile upon the last until the town despaired._
3. Extreme poverty; a condition of being very poor and lacking the means to live decently.
   - Simple: Being extremely poor, without enough money for food, shelter, or basic needs.
   - _Decades of unemployment had reduced the village to utter misery._
   - _She escaped a childhood of misery and built a stable, comfortable life._
4. A bodily ache or pain, especially a persistent or nagging one. *(dialectal)*
   - Simple: An ache or pain in the body.
   - _She rubbed liniment on the misery in her shoulder before bed._
   - _The old man groaned about the misery in his joints all winter long._

## Noun

5. Greed or avarice; an excessive love of wealth and unwillingness to part with it. *(archaic)*
   - Simple: A strong, selfish wish to keep money and never share it.
   - _Such was his misery that he begrudged his own family their daily bread._
   - _The merchant's misery drove him to cheat even his closest friends out of a few coins._

## Origin

From Middle English miserie, borrowed through Old French miserie (modern misère) from Latin miseria, itself from miser ("wretched"). It is a doublet of misère and mizeria.

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/misery (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).