scrape the (bottom of the) barrel

1. To utilize the very last of one's resources
2. To turn to something or someone as a last resort, reluctantly and perhaps not without humiliation

scrape /skrāp/

1. To pass a sharp edge over
2. To move with a grating sound over
3. To smooth, clean, clear, reduce in thickness, abrade, graze, remove, form, collect, bring, render, by such an action
4. To get together, collect by laborious effort (often with together or up)
5. To achieve with difficulty
6. To erase
7. Contemptuously, to play (the fiddle)

1. To graze (with against or on)
2. To scratch the ground
3. To grate
4. To make a grating sound
5. To draw back the foot in making a bow
6. To play the fiddle
7. To save as much as possible, enduring hardship thereby
8. To get by with difficulty (with through, along, home, etc)

1. An act, process, or period of scraping
2. A stroke of a violin, etc bow
3. A grating sound
4. A stroke (of a pen)
5. A scraped place in the ground
6. A graze or abrasion, eg on the skin
7. A shave (facetious)
8. A mass of earth scraped up, eg by a rabbit
9. A backward movement of one foot accompanying a bow
10. A scraping or thin layer
11. Thin-spread butter or margarine
12. A fight or other conflict (informal)
13. A difficult or embarrassing predicament (informal)

scrāpˈer noun

1. A person who scrapes
2. A scraping tool, instrument or machine
3. A fiddler (derogatory)
4. A barber (derogatory)
5. Any of several gallinaceous birds that scrape or scratch the ground

scrāpˈie noun

A degenerative disease caused by prions and affecting the central nervous system of sheep, characterized by acute itching, the animals rubbing against trees, etc to relieve it

scrāpˈing noun

1. The action of the verb
2. Its sound
3. A thin piece scraped off

scrappˈage noun

A scheme by which an owner of a car or other piece of equipment can claim towards the cost of replacing it

scrapeˈgood noun (archaic)

A miser

scrapeˈgut noun (archaic)

A fiddler

scrapeˈpenny noun (archaic)

A miser

scrapˈerboard noun

1. A clay-surface board on which drawings can be made by scraping tints off as well as applying them
2. Such a drawing
3. This method of making drawings

scraper ring noun (motoring)

A ring fitted on the skirt of a petrol or oil engine piston to prevent excessive oil consumption (also oil-control ring)

bow and scrape

To be over-obsequious

scrape acquaintance with

To contrive somehow to get to know

scrape the (bottom of the) barrel see under barrel