- fewness; small number
- scarcity; dearth; insufficiency
Origin of paucity
Middle English paucyte from Middle French or L: Middle French paucité from Classical Latin paucitas from paucus, few
noun
Paucity is defined as a small number of something.
An example of paucity is only a few people going to a concert.
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paucity
Webster's New World College Dictionary, Fifth Edition Copyright © 2014 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.
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"Paucity." YourDictionary. LoveToKnow. www.yourdictionary.com/Paucity.
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Paucity. (n.d.). In YourDictionary. Retrieved from https://www.yourdictionary.com/Paucity
paucity
noun
- Smallness of number; fewness.
- Scarcity; dearth: a paucity of natural resources.
Origin of paucity
Middle English paucite from Old French from Latin paucitās from paucus few ; see pau-1 in Indo-European roots.THE AMERICAN HERITAGE® DICTIONARY OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE, FIFTH EDITION by the Editors of the American Heritage Dictionaries. Copyright © 2016, 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.
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MLA Style
"Paucity." YourDictionary. LoveToKnow. www.yourdictionary.com/Paucity.
APA Style
Paucity. (n.d.). In YourDictionary. Retrieved from https://www.yourdictionary.com/Paucity
Noun
(countable and uncountable, plural paucities)
- Fewness in number; too few.
- A smallness in size or amount that is insufficient; meagerness, dearth.
Origin
From Latin paucitas (“a small number, fewness, scarcity"), from paucus (“few, little").
English Wiktionary. Available under CC-BY-SA license.
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Cite this page
MLA Style
"Paucity." YourDictionary. LoveToKnow. www.yourdictionary.com/Paucity.
APA Style
Paucity. (n.d.). In YourDictionary. Retrieved from https://www.yourdictionary.com/Paucity
Sentence Examples
- Paucity of evidence makes the first difficult.
- This paucity of animal life seems inconsistent with the theory that the islands were once connected with the mainland.
- A difficulty has been in the paucity of examples, more due to the neglect of collectors than the rarity of specimens.
- Owing to the absence of rivers, the paucity of springs, and the almost complete deforestation, Antigua is subject to frequent droughts, and although the average rainfall is 45.6 in., the variations from year to year are great.
- The habitats which they affect are the hot, dry regions of tropical America, the aridity of which they are enabled to withstand in consequence of the thickness of their skin and the paucity of evaporating pores or stomata with which they are furnished, - these conditions not permitting the moisture they contain to be carried off too rapidly; the thick fleshy stems and branches contain a store of water.
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