The act of starving, or the state of being starved. Note: This word was first used, according to Horace Walpole, by Henry Dundas, the first Lord Melville, in a speech on American affairs in 1775, which obtained for him the nickname of Starvation Dundas. "Starvation, we are also told, belongs to the class of 'vile compounds' from being a mongrel; as ...