Definition of "scurvy" in English

adjective

1. Affected or covered with scurf (“skin disease causing flakes of skin to fall off”) or scabs; scurfy, scabby; also, of or relating to a skin disease causing scurf or to scurvy (noun noun, sense 1).

2. Of growths on plants: resembling scurf; scurfy.

3. Of a person or thing: disgustingly mean; contemptible, despicable, low.

   • a scurvy knave    a scurvy trick

4. Of the way someone is treated: poor, shabby.

noun

1. (uncountable, pathology) A disease caused by insufficient intake of vitamin C, leading to the formation of livid spots on the skin, spongy gums, loosening of the teeth, and bleeding into the skin and from almost all mucous membranes; (countable, obsolete) an occurrence of this disease.

2. (countable, figurative, derogatory) A contemptible or despicable person.

3. (uncountable, by extension, veterinary medicine, obsolete) A cattle disease, perhaps affecting the skin.