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shabby

[shab-ee]

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adjective, -bi·er, -bi·est.

impaired by wear, use, etc.; worn: shabby clothes.

showing conspicuous signs of wear or neglect: The rooms on the upper floors of the mansion had a rather shabby appearance, as if they had not been much in use of late.

wearing worn clothes or having a slovenly or unkempt appearance: a shabby person.

run-down, seedy, or dilapidated: a shabby hotel.

meanly ungenerous or unfair; contemptible, as persons, actions, etc.: shabby behavior.

EXPAND

inferior; not up to par in quality, performance, etc.: a shabby rendition of the sonata.

COLLAPSE

Origin:
1660–70; shab (Middle English; Old English sceabb scab) + -y¹; cognate with German schäbig

Related forms

shab·bi·ly, adverb

shab·bi·ness, noun

un·shab·bi·ly, adverb

un·shab·by, adjective

Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2012.
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Link To shabby

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Shabby is always a great word to know.

So is flibbertigibbet. Does it mean:

a gadget; dingus; thingumbob.

a chattering or flighty, light-headed person.

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Example Sentences

Sokal was the shabby scholar, the dishonest scholar.

He still lives worse than they do, in a shabby rented house crammed with compatriots.

The memorials are still magnificent, but the park grounds are looking shabby.

EXPAND

Sokal was the shabby scholar, the dishonest scholar.

He still lives worse than they do, in a shabby rented house crammed with compatriots.

The memorials are still magnificent, but the park grounds are looking shabby.

It's true they have a long, long way to go to become carbon-free, but zero waste to landfills isn't shabby.

When plantings start to look shabby after several seasons, replant with divisions or cutting-grown plants.

The specs aren't too shabby either, although everything is based on last year's standards.

Choosing between conflicting committee meetings may be shabby consolation to the overcommitted, but it's a luxury all the same.

The shop front is dirty, the decor shabby and the goods inside are displayed without the slightest attention to aesthetics.

Despite the shabby living spaces, many families have roots that started two or three generations ago.

The shabby chic table opposite, for instance, is in my zip code range and seriously tempting.

In real life, wireless speakers tend to sound kind of shabby.

It grieves for lost influence, or fears the imminent loss of influence, and it shudders at an increasingly shabby present.

Their shabby corporate governance and their dominance of the economy were widely criticised.

May look a bit shabby in winter but revives rapidly in spring add to my plant list.

It's a really shabby way for the government to treat these guys who were drafted.

The shoes were leather and nice looking, but a bit shabby.

Many are shabby and a long way from shops, jobs and power.

The boxes will be by far the prettiest part of my car which looks kind of shabby in comparison.

All sorts of colleges seem to have been guilty of shabby marketing.

The punch-code lock on the shabby aluminum door wouldn't stop anyone serious about breaking in.

The message was that there was something dull or shabby about relying on wardrobe favorites.

Turn on a black light and these watery housing complexes go from shabby chic to day-glo fab.

In the shabby little tenement in which he lives his son is killed by a gangster who has won the affections of the son's.

Snappy bars, discotheques and boutiques have revitalized shabby neighborhoods on the hills.

Not too shabby for a model worked out with only pencil and paper.

The eighth district has become a magnet for trendy bohemians, mixing soulful chic and shabby bourgeois.

He shuffles dog-eared bits of paper from a shabby file in his knapsack and writes down the questions he is asked.

Texas, a small, shabby town on a plain so flat that to raise the eye even ten degrees would be to see only an endless sky.

India's pollution is shabby enough to be noticed straight away.

COLLAPSE

Collins

World English Dictionary

shabby (ˈʃæbɪ)

—*adj* , -bier, -biest
1.	threadbare or dilapidated in appearance
2.	wearing worn and dirty clothes; seedy
3.	mean, despicable, or unworthy: shabby treatment
4.	dirty or squalid

[C17: from Old English sceabbscab + -y¹]

'shabbily

—*adv*

'shabbiness

—n

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 10th Edition
2009 © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009
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Etymonline

Word Origin & History

shabby

1669, from shab "scab" (now only dial., in ref. to a disease of sheep), from O.E. sceabb (see scab), with sound change as described in sh-. Cf. M.Du. schabbich, Ger. schäbig "shabby." Shabby-genteel "run-down but trying to keep up appearances" first recorded 1754.

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not too shabby

Matching Quote

"When I find myself in the company of scientists, I feel like a shabby curate who has strayed by mistake into a drawing room full of dukes."

-W.H. Auden

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