piteous

from WordNet (r) 3.0 (2006)

piteous
    adj 1: deserving or inciting pity; "a hapless victim";
           "miserable victims of war"; "the shabby room struck her
           as extraordinarily pathetic"- Galsworthy; "piteous
           appeals for help"; "pitiable homeless children"; "a
           pitiful fate"; "Oh, you poor thing"; "his poor distorted
           limbs"; "a wretched life" [syn: {hapless}, {miserable},
           {misfortunate}, {pathetic}, {piteous}, {pitiable},
           {pitiful}, {poor}, {wretched}]

from The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48

Piteous \Pit"e*ous\, a. [OE. pitous, OF. pitos, F. piteux. See
   {Pity}.]
   1. Pious; devout. [Obs.]
      [1913 Webster]

            The Lord can deliver piteous men from temptation.
                                                  --Wyclif.
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   2. Evincing pity, compassion, or sympathy; compassionate;
      tender. "[She] piteous of his case." --Pope.
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            She was so charitable and so pitous.  --Chaucer.
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   3. Fitted to excite pity or sympathy; wretched; miserable;
      lamentable; sad; as, a piteous case.        --Spenser.
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            The most piteous tale of Lear.        --Shak.
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   4. Paltry; mean; pitiful. "Piteous amends." --Milton.
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   Syn: Sorrowful; mournful; affecting; doleful; woeful; rueful;
        sad; wretched; miserable; pitiable; pitiful;
        compassionate.
        [1913 Webster] -- {Pit"e*ous*ly}, adv. --
        {Pit"e*ous*ness}, n.
        [1913 Webster]

from Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0

53 Moby Thesaurus words for "piteous":
      affecting, afflictive, beseeching, bitter, bleak, cheerless,
      comfortless, deplorable, depressing, depressive, discomforting,
      dismal, dismaying, distressful, distressing, doleful, dolorific,
      dolorogenic, dolorous, dreary, emotional, entreating, grievous,
      heartrending, imploring, joyless, lamentable, melancholy,
      miserable, mournful, moving, painful, pathetic, pitiable, pitiful,
      plaintive, poignant, poor, regrettable, rueful, ruined, sad,
      saddening, sharp, sore, sorrowful, supplicating, tearful, touching,
      uncomfortable, woebegone, woeful, wretched