meskin مسكين
Tunisian Derja · adjective
“meskin” (مسكين) is an adjective in Tunisian Derja meaning poor thing, pitiable.
Meanings
- poor thing, pitiable
- meek, harmless, kind
- destitute, wretched
Usage
Meskin mainly expresses compassion: "the poor thing!". It is often used alone as an exclamation, or placed before the sentence: "meskin, mridh". The feminine is meskina and the plural is msakin. It can also describe someone gentle and without malice: "rajel meskin", "a good, harmless man". Depending on tone, it can become ironic or condescending. Like English "poor", it points more often to pity than to material poverty, for which zawali is used instead.
Example
مسكين، مريض من البارح
meskin, mridh mel bera7
“The poor thing, he's been sick since yesterday.”
How to write it in Latin letters
In Arabizi, Darija written in Latin letters, you will find “meskin” but also “meskine”, “miskin”, “mskin” and “meskina”. No spelling is official: people write the sounds as they hear them.
Type “meskin” on the Arabic keyboard
In Moroccan Darija
Spelt the same way in Arabic, the word also exists in Moroccan Darija, where it means “poor thing, pitiable”; “kind, harmless, decent”: mskin in Moroccan.
In Algerian Darja
Spelt the same way in Arabic, the word also exists in Algerian Darja, where it means “poor thing (compassion)”; “poor, destitute”: meskin in Algerian.