early 1600s, Beaumont and Fletcher (attributed), The Nice Valour, Act V, Scene 3, in The Works of Mr. Francis Beaumont, and Mr. John Fletcher, London: J. & R. Tonson and S. Draper, 1750, Volume 10, p. 359,
This is Love’s beggary right, that now is ours,
When Ladies love, and cannot shew their Powers.

1782, Frances Burney, Cecilia, London: T. Payne & Son and T. Cadell, Volume I, Book I, Chapter 9, p. 128,
[…] she does not come hither as a beggar, however well the state of beggary may accord with her poverty: she only sollicits the payment of a bill […]

The matter to be decided involved, in addition to the personal risks of life and liberty, the probable forfeiture of an immense estate, and the beggary, in consequence, of an only and beloved daughter.

[…] the landlady […] ushered them into a large garret where twenty or thirty people of all ages and both sexes lay and dozed away the day, choosing the evening and night for their trades of beggary, thieving, or prostitution.

[…] perhaps he would abandon beggary when there was no poor fool about to beg from.

Beggary

Meaning

Noun

Adj

Related