starveling
One barely surviving
A starveling is a person or animal weakened or emaciated from lack of food.
The word is literary and old-fashioned, carrying a pitiful or pathetic tone: The starveling cat appeared at our door.
As an adjective, it describes things that are meager, underfed, or stunted: starveling wages, a starveling crop.
Lean from deprivation
- skeletalOf or like bones
- wastedUsed without good result
- cadaverousResembling the deceased
- haggardExhausted in appearance
malnourished · underfed · undernourished · scrawny · bony · shriveled · pinched · lank
Neglected street child
- foundlingAbandoned child discovered
- orphanChild whose parents died
- castawayShipwrecked and stranded person
- strayWander from course
forsaken · neglected · outcast · ragamuffin · guttersnipe · abandoned · wretched · pitiable
Intensely, painfully hungry
- ravenousExtremely hungry, insatiable
- piningAching with prolonged desire
- cravingPowerful urge to have
- emptyHolding nothing inside
fasting · voracious · insatiable · unsatisfied · gnawing · hollow · aching · desperate
Utterly without means
- indigentExtremely poor, lacking necessities
- needyWanting in essentials
- penuriousExcessively frugal or poor
- poverty-strickenExtremely poor condition
penniless · hand-to-mouth · necessitous · beggared · poorhouse · alms · workhouse · want
gaunt
Lean from deprivation
- skeletalOf or like bones
- wastedUsed without good result
- cadaverousResembling the deceased
haggard · malnourished · underfed · undernourished · scrawny · bony · shriveled · pinched · lank · atrophied
urchin
Neglected street child
- foundlingAbandoned child discovered
- orphanChild whose parents died
- castawayShipwrecked and stranded person
stray · forsaken · neglected · outcast · ragamuffin · guttersnipe · abandoned · wretched · pitiable · forlorn
famished
Intensely, painfully hungry
empty · fasting · voracious · insatiable · unsatisfied · gnawing · hollow · aching · desperate · wolfish
destitute
Utterly without means
- indigentExtremely poor, lacking necessities
- needyWanting in essentials
- penuriousExcessively frugal or poor
poverty-stricken · penniless · hand-to-mouth · necessitous · beggared · poorhouse · alms · workhouse · want · privation