Ungain

adj

adj ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Adjective
  1. 1
    ungainly; clumsy or awkward UK, dialectal, obsolete

    "she take th ' ungain'st weas she can"

  2. 2
    troublesome or inconvenient UK, dialectal, obsolete

    "to know a person if one leaves but a quart in a hogshead, it's two pints too much. That's my notion. But, Sir, that was but an ungain business at 'Squire Monckton's t'other morning. Every body was no-how, as one may say."

Example

More examples

"she take th ' ungain'st weas she can"

Etymology

From Middle English ungain, ungayn, ungein, equivalent to un- + gain (“suitable; convenient”). See ungainly.

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.