noun
thin legs; skinny shins
Rare term referring to thin or slender lower legs. Often used in set expressions like 痩せ脛を食う (to live off someone else's money, literally 'to eat someone's skinny shins').
彼は親の痩せ脛をかじって暮らしている。
He lives off his parents' money (literally, 'gnawing at their skinny shins').
「痩せ脛」という言葉は、現代ではほとんど使われない。
The word 痩せ脛 is rarely used in modern Japanese.
Compound of 痩せ (yase, 'thinness') and 脛 (zune, 'shin'). The exact historical derivation is uncertain, but the term is now rare and mostly preserved in idiomatic expressions.