pittance

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pit·tance

(pĭt′ns)

1. A meager monetary allowance, wage, or remuneration.

2. A very small amount: not a pittance of remorse.

[Middle English pitance, from Old French, allowance of food to a monk or poor person, from Medieval Latin pietantia, from *pietāns, *pietant-, present participle of *pietāre, to show compassion, from Latin pietās, piety; see pity.]

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

pittance

(ˈpɪtəns)

a small amount or portion, esp a meagre allowance of money

[C16: from Old French pietance ration, ultimately from Latin pietās duty]

Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged, 12th Edition 2014 © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1994, 1998, 2000, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2011, 2014

pit•tance

(ˈpɪt ns)

n.

1. a small amount or share.

2. a small allowance of money.

3. a scanty wage or remuneration.

[1175–1225; Middle English pitaunce < Old French pitance, variant of pietance piety, pity, allowance of food]

Pittance

a small portion; a small number or amount.

Examples: pittance of food; of grace, 1561; of instruction, 1841; of learning; of money; of reason and truth, 1561; of wages, 1749.

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Noun

pittance - an inadequate payment; "they work all day for a mere pittance"

payment - a sum of money paid or a claim discharged

pittance

noun peanuts (slang), trifle, modicum, drop, mite, chicken feed (slang), slave wages, small allowance Her secretaries work tirelessly for a pittance.

Collins Thesaurus of the English Language – Complete and Unabridged 2nd Edition. 2002 © HarperCollins Publishers 1995, 2002

Translations

miseria

pittance

[ˈpɪtəns] N → miseria f
she gets paid a pittance → le pagan una miseria

Collins Spanish Dictionary - Complete and Unabridged 8th Edition 2005 © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1971, 1988 © HarperCollins Publishers 1992, 1993, 1996, 1997, 2000, 2003, 2005

pittance

[ˈpɪt^əns] n → bouchée f de pain (fig)
He is paid a mere pittance → On ne le paye qu'une bouchée de pain.

Collins English/French Electronic Resource. © HarperCollins Publishers 2005

pittance

n → Hungerlohn m

Collins German Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged 7th Edition 2005. © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1980 © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1997, 1999, 2004, 2005, 2007

pittance

[ˈpɪt/əns] n → miseria, somma miserabile

Collins Italian Dictionary 1st Edition © HarperCollins Publishers 1995

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References in classic literature ?

She then betook herself to the business of packing, for which a small quantity of brown paper sufficed, and, having received her small pittance of wages, she returned home.

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This store was now nearly exhausted, and she had found a milliner who gave her a miserable pittance for toiling with her needle eight or ten hours each day.

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Amelia thinks, and thinks, and racks her brain, to find some means of increasing the small pittance upon which the household is starving.

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Robert is very well in a way, to give up all the money he can earn to the family, and keep the barest pittance for himself.

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A puny, miserable little creature like Dickenson could prate of happiness and turn a shining face to the future - Dickenson who lived upon a pittance, who depended upon the whim of his employer, and who confessed to ambitions which were surely pitiable.

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She procured plain work; she plaited straw and by various means contrived to earn a pittance scarcely sufficient to support life.

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"As soon as they have completed the term of eighty years, they are looked on as dead in law; their heirs immediately succeed to their estates; only a small pittance is reserved for their support; and the poor ones are maintained at the public charge.

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They had no provisions left but a few dried salmon, yet finding the white men equally in want, they generously offered to share even this meager pittance, and frequently repeated the offer, with an earnestness that left no doubt of their sincerity.

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He received a starvation pittance for his labors, which it was my duty to augment, a duty which, with many others, I neglected.

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Both Jonas and Marija might soon be earning no more than enough to pay their board, and besides that there were only the wages of Ona and the pittance of the little boy.

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All their remaining stock of provisions consisted of forty pounds of Indian corn, twenty pounds of grease, about five pounds of portable soup, and a sufficient quantity of dried meat to allow each man a pittance of five pounds and a quarter, to be reserved for emergencies.

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She knew of none save those to which you subscribe a pittance weekly in anticipation of rainy days, and the London clubs were her scorn.