mis-ˈspend, v.
Also 4–8 misp-, (4–6 mysp-).
[mis-1 1.]
trans. To spend amiss or wastefully; to make a bad, useless, or wasteful expenditure of.
| c 1375 Sc. Leg. Saints xxxiv. (Pelagia) 44 Scho þat welth & þat beute myspendit in sic degre, þat [etc.]. 1377 Langl. P. Pl. B. xv. 74 How þat folke in folyes myspenden her fyue wittes. 1460 Pol. Rel. & L. Poems (1903) 206, I haue mysspendyd my yonge age In synne, and wantonnehed also. 1494 Fabyan Chron. vi. clxx. 164 Gouernours therof mysspent the patrymony therof in excesse. 1530 Palsgr. 638/1 Myspende nat your monay, you may happe to have nede of it. 1597 Pilgrim. Parnass. v. (1886) 19, I have beene guiltie of mispending some time in philosophie. 1697 Dryden æneid Ded., Some similitude, which diverts..your attention from the main Subject, and mispends it on some trivial Image. a 1721 Prior On a Pretty Madwoman i, Our grief's misplac'd, our tears mis-spent. 1812 Byron Ch. Har. i. xxvii, His early youth, misspent in maddest whim. 1858 Froude Hist. Eng. (1858) II. vi. 15 [They] vowed to accept no benefice, lest they should misspend the property of the poor. |