diminutive
Syllables: di·min·u·tiveUK/dɪˈmɪn.jə.tɪv/
More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations
New Zealand/dəˈmən.jə.təv/
diminutive adjective: very small.
Adjective
diminutive (comparative more diminutive, superlative most diminutive)
- Very small.
- Mrs. Washington ("Oh, la, call me Martha, Boys") is a diminutive woman with a cheerful rather than happy air, who seems to bustle even when standing still..1997, Thomas Pynchon, Mason & Dixon, New York: Henry Holt and Company, →ISBN, →OCLC, page 229
- Roman Sharonov rose unchallenged to head a corner wide, while diminutive winger Gokdeniz Karadeniz ghosted in with a diving header from the edge of the six-yard box that was acrobatically kept out by Gomes.2011 October 20, Jamie Lillywhite, “Tottenham 1 - 0 Rubin Kazan”, in BBC Sport
- Synonyms:
- lilliputian, tiny
- Serving to diminish.
- They cou’d, perhaps, even embrace POVERTY contentedly, rather than submit to any thing diminutive either of their inward Freedom or national Liberty.1711, Anthony Ashley-Cooper, 3rd Earl of Shaftesbury, Characteristicks of Men, Manners, Opinions, Times, 1714 edition republished by Gregg International Publishers, 1968, Volume 3, Miscellany 3...
- Of or pertaining to, or creating a word form expressing smallness, youth, unimportance, or endearment.
- Antonyms:
- augmentative
Noun
diminutive (plural diminutives)
- A word form expressing smallness, youth, unimportance, or endearment.
- Booklet, the diminutive of book, means ‘small book’.
- But I was frightfully fond of the universe and wanted to address it by a diminutive. I often did so; and it never seemed to mind.1908, G.K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy
- Synonyms:
- nomen deminutivum
- Antonyms:
- augmentative
- The smallest, thinnest version of a traditional heraldic ordinary ("geometric shape on a shield"), often used to represent multiple instances of a charge or to modify a main, central, and larger charge; not itself modifiable.
diminutive meaning in Tamil, Urdu, Bengali and Malayalam
diminutive in Tamil
- மிகக்குறுகிய, மிகச் சிறிய, மிகச் சுருங்கிய
diminutive in Urdu
- صغیر
diminutive in Bengali
- খুব ছোটো, ক্ষুদ্র, মিনিয়েচার, হ্রাসকারী, কমানোর উপযোগী, ছোটোত্ব
diminutive in Malayalam
- small, tiny, little
- ചെറിയ, കുറിയതായ, കൃശമായ, തീരെ ചെറുതായ, കുറുകിയ, കുറിയ
More languagesFewer languages
- diminutive in Kannada
- ತೀರ ಚಿಕ್ಕ, ಚೀಕು
- diminutive in Gujarati
- લઘુતાદર્શક laghutādarśak
- diminutive in Sinhala
- ඉතා කුඩා
- diminutive in Arabic
- ضَئِيل ḍaʔīl, تَصْغِيرِيّ taṣḡīriyy, تَصْغِير taṣḡīr
- diminutive in Persian
- کوچکنما kučak-namâ, تصغیر tasġir
- diminutive in Thai
- คำเรียกชื่อเล่น
- diminutive in Vietnamese
- nhỏ xíu, giảm kích
Examples of diminutive in a sentence
- When we come to occupative names, we are again confronted by crowds of diminutives.1916, Ernest Weekley, Surnames, page 287:
- The British use the term “fidlets”, a diminutive of “Fid”, which in turn is an acronym for Falkland Island Dependencies, the former name of the British Antarctic Survey.2024 June 20, Eva Corlett, “Fidlets, fingies and riding a doo: study sheds light on Antarctic English slang”, in The Guardian:
Synonyms of diminutive
Antonyms
Forms of diminutive
| Adjective | |
|---|---|
| comparative | more diminutive |
| superlative | most diminutive |
| alternative abbreviation | dim. |
| Noun | |
| plural | diminutives |
Origin of diminutive
Inherited from Middle English diminutif, derived from Old French diminutif, derived from Latin dīminutīv|us, ~a, ~um (adjective), from dīminūt|us, ~a, ~um (participle), perfect passive participle of dīmin|uō, ~uere, ~uī, ~ūtum (verb). First attested in 1398.
Words formed from diminutive
Questions about diminutive
- What does diminutive mean?
- Diminutive means very small.
- What is diminutive in Tamil?
- Diminutive in Tamil is மிகக்குறுகிய, மிகச் சிறிய, மிகச் சுருங்கிய. See Diminutive meaning in Tamil.
- How do you use diminutive in a sentence?
- When we come to occupative names, we are again confronted by crowds of diminutives.
- What part of speech is diminutive?
- Diminutive can be an adjective or a noun.
- How do you pronounce diminutive?
- Diminutive is pronounced /dɪˈmɪn.jə.tɪv/ (UK).
Words near diminutive in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: diminutive (page history and authors); diminutive (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); diminutive (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); diminutive (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); diminutive (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license); diminutive (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); લઘુતાદર્શક (Gujarati) (page history and authors); diminutive (Sinhala Wiktionary) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-diminutive.ogg, en-au-diminutive.ogg.
Cite this entry: “diminutive.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/diminutive. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.