scanty

the word 'scanty' originates from the old norse adjective 'skammr', meaning short, which was neutered to 'skamt' and adopted into middle english as 'skant', signifying a limited or barely sufficient amount. the addition of the productive english adjectival suffix '-y', derived from old english '-ig', transformed it into 'scanty', characterizing something as being of short measure or inadequate quantity. this etymological journey from a concrete descriptor of physical length to an abstract assessment of sufficiency illustrates a common semantic shift, where spatial terms evolve into quantitative evaluations. the modern sense fully retains this core logic of insufficiency and marginal adequacy.

Structure: scant (barely sufficient) + y (adjective-forming suffix) scant (from old norse 'skamt', meaning short, brief, neuter of 'skammr' short) + y (from old english '-ig', a suffix forming adjectives meaning "characterized by, full of").