DIMINUTIVE • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Diminutive

Add this Dictionary
to your website!
See more options...

/dɪmˈɪnjətɪv/ Listen

adjective

Diminutive adj.

Below the average size; very small; little.

Expressing diminution; as, a diminutive word.

Tending to diminish. (R.) "Diminutive of liberty."

noun

Diminutive n.

Something of very small size or value; an insignificant thing. "Such water flies, diminutives of nature."

(Gram.) A derivative from a noun, denoting a small or a young object of the same kind with that denoted by the primitive; as, gosling, eaglet, lambkin. "Babyisms and dear diminutives." Note: The word sometimes denotes a derivative verb which expresses a diminutive or petty form of the action, as scribble.

See images of 'Diminutive'

Etymology of 'Diminutive'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

Share |

"Diminutive" Quotes from Famous Books

... pocket a diminutive vial, the smallest I had ever seen, in which were a number of little white granules, about the size of the head of a pin. A printed label was wound around the vial, and it bore the word "Arsenicum." It passed from hand to hand, and ...

— Off-Hand Sketches - a Little Dashed with Humor • T. S. Arthur

... among broken hills until they reached a summit. From that point on, now and again the road elbowed into view of a wide plain, and in the center of the plain there was a diminutive dump of buildings. ...

— The Rangeland Avenger • Max Brand

... ourselves opposite a beach bordered by a broad line of surf, which indicated that the water here was very shallow for some distance from the shore. Both the surf and the beach seemed to be alive with black children, so diminutive were the forms who disported themselves in the breakers, or ran up and down upon the sand with the eagerness and agility generally displayed by boys at the seaside. As to the real ages of these people, however, we were not left long in doubt. Four ...

— Adventures in Southern Seas - A Tale of the Sixteenth Century • George Forbes

... talked on. He slid a five-dollar bill from his diminutive roll and gallantly paid up. His only comment when, in the car, Mother secretly asked how much he had been overcharged, was the reflection, "They certainly ought to make money out of those tea-rooms. Their profit must be something like five ...

— The Innocents - A Story for Lovers • Sinclair Lewis

... dogs, in their joy at seeing him, gave expression to it in their own peculiar way. A big Muskymote knocked down a little Corbeau and straightway began to worry it, while a Chocolat did the same with a diminutive tete-noire. ...

— The Rising of the Red Man - A Romance of the Louis Riel Rebellion • John Mackie

More quotes...