Pronunciations (3)
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/ˈθɹɛdbɛə/
Pronunciation notes
- Received-Pronunciation
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/ˈθɹɛdˌbɛ(ə)ɹ/
Pronunciation notes
- General-American
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ˈθɹɛdbɛə(ɹ)
Adjective
Of cloth, clothing, furnishings, etc.: frayed and worn to an extent that the nap is damaged and the warp and weft threads show; shabby, worn-out.
- Examples
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His life vvas nigh vnto deaths dore yplaſte, / And thred-bare cote, and cobled ſhoes hee vvare, […]
VVill any Freedom here from you be born, / VVhoſe Cloaths are thred-bare, and vvhoſe Cloaks are torn?
More examples (5)
We are told, that an ancient tragic poet, to move the pity of his audience for his exiled kings and distressed heroes, used to make the actors represent them in dresses and clothes that were thread-bare and decayed.
No one stops to question the coin of a rich man; but a poor devil cannot pass off either a joke or a guinea, without its being examined on both sides. Wit and coin are always doubted with a threadbare coat.
Ah! You may look through that shirt till your eyes ache; but you won't find a hole in it, nor a thread-bare place. It's the best he had, and a fine one too.
The shabbiness of these attendants upon shabbiness, the poverty of these insolvent waiters upon insolvency, was a sight to see. Such threadbare coats and trousers, such fusty gowns and shawls, such squashed hats and bonnets, such boots and shoes, such umbrellas and walking-sticks, never were seen in Rag Fair.
Unkempt, in threadbare clothes, with holed shoes and sun-cured hide, my costume is permanent: the traveler, the man from far away.
In poor condition; damaged, shabby; also, poorly equipped or provided for, inadequate, meagre, scanty.
Usage- Figurative
- Examples
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Welth and wyt, I say, be so threde bare worne, / That all is without measure, and fer beyonde the mone.
From an Underſtanding and a Conſcience, thread-bare and ragged vvith perpetual turning; […]
More examples (2)
Holy Virgin stood in the main Convent of Glatz, in rather a threadbare condition, when the Prussians first approached; the Jesuits, and ardently Orthodox of both sexes, flagitating Heaven and her with their prayers, that she would vouchsafe to keep the Prussians out.
“I told you the trip insurance was worth it --” “There it is!” “You said it was a waste of money.” “I still think $5 is too much. This blanket is thread-bare.”
Of an argument, excuse, etc.: used so often that it is no longer effective or interesting; banal, clichéd, trite.
Usage- Figurative
- Antonyms
An argument or assertion with little in the way of substance or supporting evidence.
Usage- Figurative
- Examples
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More examples (1)
But with so many tired, lazy callbacks to its own threadbare catalog (including “Love Is Not The Answer,” a watery echo of the epic “I Believe In A Thing Called Love” from 2003’s Permission To Land), Hot Cakes marks the point where The Darkness has stopped cannibalizing the golden age of stadium rock and simply started cannibalizing itself.
Of a person: wearing clothes of threadbare (sense 1) material; hence, impoverished, poor.
Usage- Archaic
- Obsolete
- Synonyms
- Examples
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Be gon, all Honeſty, / Thou fooliſh, ſlender, thredbare, ſtarving thing, be gon!
Adjective
repeated too often; overfamiliar through overuse
- Examples
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his remarks were trite and commonplace
hackneyed phrases
More examples (4)
a stock answer
repeating threadbare jokes
parroting some timeworn axiom
the trite metaphor ‘hard as nails’
having the nap worn away so that the threads show through
- Examples
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threadbare rugs