exigent

(ĕk'sə-jənt)
adj.

1. Requiring immediate action or remedy. See synonyms at urgent.
2. Requiring much effort or expense; demanding.

[Latin exigēns, exigent-, present participle of exigere, to demand. See exact.]

exigently ex'i·gent·ly adv.

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Neither word is common in ordinary usage and both are marked 'formal' in the COD (2006). Both are related to Latin exigere in its two meanings 'to enforce payment of' and 'to weigh exactly'. Exigent corresponds to the first of these and means 'exacting' or 'urgent':

He was a man whose personal life, though occasionally exigent, never became a siren song—A. S. Byatt, 1988

It was...very much the brainchild of its two editors who ensured that its range and quality of content was up to their own exigent standards—Independent, 1999.

Exiguous corresponds to the second meaning and means 'very small, sparse, scanty':

She gulped it down, paid the exiguous dispensing fee, and left the premises—E. R. Taylor, 1991

For an octogenarian who has led an extraordinarily rich life, a mere two sparse pages of chronology is just about as biographically exiguous as you can get—Times Higher Education Supplement, 2002.

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adjective

1. Compelling immediate attention: burning, crying, dire, emergent, imperative, instant, pressing, urgent. See big/small/amount.
2. Requiring great or extreme bodily, mental, or spiritual strength: arduous, backbreaking, burdensome, demanding, difficult, effortful, exacting, formidable, hard, heavy, laborious, onerous, oppressive, rigorous, rough, severe, taxing, tough, trying, weighty. See heavy/light.

adj

Definition: difficult, taxing
Antonyms: easy, facile, unpressured

adj

Definition: urgent, pressing
Antonyms: ordinary, unpressured, usual

For a list of words related to exigent, see:

• Demanding, Critical, Calculating, or Selfish

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See words rhyming with "exigent."